ukulele

Etymology

It is borrowed from Hawaiian ʻukulele,^{[1][2][3][4][5]} literally "jumping flea" or "leaping flea",^{[3][4][6][7][8]} formed from ʻuku (“louse, flea”) and lele (“to fly, jump, leap”).^{[1][2][3][4][9]} The American Heritage Dictionary traces the two parts to Proto-Polynesian *kutu (“louse”) and *lele,^[9] and Partridge compares Tahitian rere, with r for l.^[10] Etymonline notes that the word was recorded earlier in English as the Hawaiian word for a flea.^[3] The name of the instrument is explained in two ways: Etymonline, Klein and the American Heritage Dictionary point to the quick movement of the player's fingers.^[3][11][9] Merriam-Webster's Book of Word Histories, the Merriam-Webster Unabridged, Barnhart and Dictionary.com instead link it to Edward Purvis, a small and lively British army officer at the court of King Kalakaua whose Hawaiian nickname this was, and who popularized the instrument;^{[12][5][4][13]} Merriam-Webster calls this probable,^[5] Barnhart only possible,^[4] and the Oxford Dictionary of Word Origins tells it as a story.^[14]

Earliest recorded meaning

A small four-stringed guitar of Hawaii: 1896, in the OED's first quotation, from a Hawaiian periodical.^[2] Etymonline, Barnhart and the Merriam-Webster Unabridged give the same year,^[3][4][5] and Barnhart and Dictionary.com label it an Americanism.^[4][13]

Semantic evolution

The instrument developed from one that Portuguese immigrants brought to Hawaii around 1879:^[2][3][4] according to Merriam-Webster's Book of Word Histories they came from Madeira, and among their instruments was the Portuguese machete, a small four-stringed guitar, whose Portuguese name was soon forgotten once it became popular under its Hawaiian one.^[12][14] Barnhart notes two waves of popularity in the United States, in the 1920s and again in the late 1940s.^[4] The spelling ukelele is recorded as a less common variant.^[5][8][7]

Timeline

• 1896 – a small four-stringed guitar of Hawaiian origin.^[2][3][4][5]

Meanings

Noun

1. A small guitar with four strings, developed from a Portuguese instrument and made popular in Hawaii in the 1880s, played by plucking or strumming with the fingers: She strummed a ukulele while the others sang.^[5][8][2]

Word family

• uke

Related words

• banjolele

Usage notes

Merriam-Webster and Collins also record the spelling ukelele.^[5][8]

References

1. ^ a b c Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
3. ^ a b c d e f g h Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
4. ^ a b c d e f g h i j Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
5. ^ a b c d e f g h Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
6. ^ Stevenson, Angus, ed. (2010), Oxford Dictionary of English, 3rd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
7. ^ a b Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
8. ^ a b c d Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins
9. ^ a b c The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (online 2024), 5th ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
10. ^ Partridge, Eric (1966), Origins: A Short Etymological Dictionary of Modern English, 4th ed., London: Routledge & Kegan Paul
11. ^ Klein, Ernest. A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the English Language. 2 vols. Amsterdam: Elsevier, 1966–1967.
12. ^ a b Merriam-Webster's Book of Word Histories, Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
13. ^ a b Dictionary.com Unabridged (2016), based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, New York: Random House
14. ^ a b Cresswell, Julia (2021), Oxford Dictionary of Word Origins, 3rd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press