Etymologically
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twilight

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Pronunciation

  • /ˈtwaɪˌlaɪt/[1]

Etymology

It is a late twilight, formed from English twi- + light,[2][3][4] corresponding to Dutch tweelicht (from the 16th century), Low German twilecht and German Zwielicht.[2][4] The force of twi- ("two") is unclear: Barnhart, Etymonline and Word Origins think it means "half" light,[3][4][5] while Skeat took it as "between", like Middle High German zwischenlicht, literally "between-light".[6][2][7] Klein instead derived the English word from Middle Flemish twilicht.[8]

Earliest recorded meaning

The light from the sky after sunset: 1412–20, in Lydgate's Troy Book.[2][3] The rare form twilighting is recorded a little earlier, in the late 14th century.[2][4]

Semantic evolution

The word was used mostly of evening light, but of the morning dawn as well from about 1440.[2][4] From Milton (1667) it could mean any dim light or half-darkness.[2][4] Figurative uses began with Shakespeare's Sonnets (1609), for an intermediate condition such as the decline of life,[2][4] and soon after for dim or imperfect understanding.[2] Johnson (1755) defined the adjective as dimly lit or shaded, quoting Milton's "twilight groves".[9] Twilight of the gods, the destruction of the gods in Norse and German myth, is a translation of German Götterdämmerung from the 18th century.[5][7] Twilight zone was a part of the sky lit by twilight in 1901 and an area of uncertain rules or status from 1909.[4]

Timeline

  • late 14th century – twilighting.[4][2]
  • 1412–20 – the light after sunset, in Lydgate.[2][3]
  • c. 1440 – morning twilight.[2]
  • 1609 – figurative: an intermediate state, in Shakespeare.[2]
  • 1645 – adjective: of or like twilight, in Milton.[2]
  • 1667 – any dim light, in Milton.[2]
  • 1819 – verb: to light dimly, in Keats.[2]
  • 1909 – twilight zone in an extended sense.[4]

Modern meaning

Noun

  1. The soft, diffused light from the sky when the sun is just below the horizon, especially after sunset.
  2. The period of the day when this light occurs; dusk.
  3. (astronomy) The time during which the sun is a set angle below the horizon, as in civil, nautical or astronomical twilight.
  4. A period of gradual decline or ending: the twilight of a long career.
  5. A state of uncertainty or vagueness.

Adjective

  1. Of, like or happening in twilight; dim.

Word family

  • twilit
  • twilight sleep
  • twilight zone

References

  1. ^ Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
  2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
  3. ^ a b c d Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
  4. ^ a b c d e f g h i j Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
  5. ^ a b Cresswell, Julia (2021), Oxford Dictionary of Word Origins, 3rd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
  6. ^ Skeat, Walter W. (1911), A Concise Etymological Dictionary of the English Language, new ed., Oxford: Clarendon Press
  7. ^ a b Weekley, Ernest (1921), An Etymological Dictionary of Modern English, London: John Murray
  8. ^ Klein, Ernest. A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the English Language. 2 vols. Amsterdam: Elsevier, 1966–1967.
  9. ^ Johnson, Samuel (1755), A Dictionary of the English Language, London; 4th ed. 1773; Johnson's Dictionary Online, ed. Beth Rapp Young et al.