unanimous

Etymology

It is borrowed from Latin ūnanimus (“of one mind”), also ūnanimis,^[2][3][4][5] with the English suffix -ous.^[2][6][7] The Latin adjective combines ūnus (“one”) and animus (“mind, spirit”),^{[8][4][5][9][10]} so that it meant "of a single mind".^[8] The first part goes back to Proto-Indo-European *oi-no- (“one, unique”),^[4][5] and the American Heritage Dictionary puts the second under the root Proto-Indo-European *anə-.^[5] The word is related to one, animal and animate.^[8][9] English had earlier borrowed the same Latin adjective as unanime, recorded from 1610 to 1656.^[2] Johnson (1755) gave French unanime as well as the Latin word as its source.^[11]

Earliest recorded meaning

Of persons, of one mind, all in agreement: Etymonline dates it to the 1610s and Merriam-Webster to 1624, and the OED's first quotation is from a sermon of Donne, before 1631.^[4][12][2] Barnhart finds it implied in unanimously before 1619,^[13] and the OED records that adverb from 1611, earlier than the adjective.^[2]

Semantic evolution

From 1675 the word was also used of decisions, votes and statements, meaning held or given with everyone's agreement;^[2][3] this is now one of its commonest uses.^[14][12] Johnson (1755) defined it as being of one mind, agreeing in design or opinion, with quotations from Milton's Paradise Lost and Dryden.^[11] The noun unanimity is much older, recorded from 1436, a borrowing from Middle French.^[13] The adverb unanimously had for a time the sense "in harmony" (before 1620 to 1647), now obsolete.^[2]

Timeline

• 1436 – the noun unanimite, unanimity.^[13]
• 1610 – unanime, the earlier borrowing (obsolete by 1656).^[2]
• 1610s – unanimous, of one mind.^[4]
• 1611 – the adverb unanimously.^[2]
• 1624 – first known use in Merriam-Webster.^[12]
• before 1631 – first quotation in the OED, from Donne.^[2]
• 1675 – of votes, decisions or statements, showing general agreement.^[2]

Meanings

Adjective

1. Fully in agreement; of one mind: The judges were unanimous in their verdict.^[14][12][2]
2. Showing or based on the agreement of everyone involved, without dissent: a unanimous ruling.^[14][12][2]

Word family

• unanimously
• unanimousness
• nonunanimous

Related words

• unanimity
• animus
• unanime
• animal
• animate
• one

References

1. ^ a b Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
3. ^ a b Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
4. ^ a b c d e Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
5. ^ a b c d The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (online 2024), 5th ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
6. ^ Hoad, T. F., ed. (1986), The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology, Oxford: Clarendon Press
7. ^ Stevenson, Angus, ed. (2010), Oxford Dictionary of English, 3rd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
8. ^ a b c Ayto, John (2005), Word Origins: The Secret Histories of English Words from A to Z, 2nd ed., London: A & C Black
9. ^ a b Klein, Ernest. A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the English Language. 2 vols. Amsterdam: Elsevier, 1966–1967.
10. ^ Skeat, Walter W. (1911), A Concise Etymological Dictionary of the English Language, new ed., Oxford: Clarendon Press
11. ^ a b Johnson, Samuel (1755), A Dictionary of the English Language, London; 4th ed. 1773; Johnson's Dictionary Online, ed. Beth Rapp Young et al.
12. ^ a b c d e Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
13. ^ a b c Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
14. ^ a b c Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins