Etymologically
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wicket

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Pronunciation

Etymology

It is inherited from Middle English wiket,[2][3][4] borrowed from Anglo-Norman wiket, from Old Northern French wiket,[5][6][7][2] the northern form of Old French guichet, whence French guichet (“ticket window”);[5][6][3] compare Norman viquet and Walloon wichet.[5][6] The Anglo-Norman word is recorded from the third quarter of the 12th century, meaning a wicket gate, a small door or opening.[8] The French word is usually referred to the Germanic root of Old Norse víkja (“to move, turn”),[5][7][9][10] as in Swedish vika and Danish vige,[5][7] and compared with vík (“nook”),[3][6] Old English wīcan (“to give way, yield”) and Middle Dutch wiket;[6][4][11] Wiktionary gives Proto-Germanic *wīkwaną,[12] and Etymonline traces it to Proto-Indo-European *weyk- (“to bend, wind”), the idea being something that turns.[6][13] Hoad calls the origin uncertain,[14] and the OED notes that the forms guischet and Old Occitan guisquet may point to another source,[5] and Skeat derived it from the root of whisk;[15] Weekley reports that derivation but doubts it, since English has no -s-.[16] It is related to weak and week.[4][3]

Earliest recorded meaning

A small door or gate, especially one set in or beside a larger one: probably about 1225 in King Horn in Barnhart,[3] before 1300 in the OED,[5] early 13th century in Etymonline.[6] The OED's earliest record of the word is in 1296, for a small opening such as a loophole or grille.[5]

Semantic evolution

A wicket let people in or out without the trouble of opening the heavy main gate; from there the word came to mean any small gate for people on foot, or a small opening such as a loophole or grille.[10][5] Chaucer used it seven times.[17] In cricket the word is recorded from 1662,[5] from 1733 in Barnhart and Etymonline;[3][6] the link with a gate is clearer when one knows that the first wickets had two stumps with one long bail.[10] From 1738 it also referred to a batsman's turn at the wicket, from 1862 to the pitch, and since 1941 it has given phrases like on a good wicket, in a favourable position.[5] In American English it has meant a croquet hoop since 1868 (Louisa May Alcott's Little Women),[5] and a ticket-office or teller's window with a grille, a sense Barnhart dates to 1813.[3][18] Technical senses followed, such as a small sluice gate in a canal lock (1875).[5] In 16th-century slang wicket was the mouth or throat.[19]

Timeline

  • third quarter of the 12th century – Anglo-Norman wiket, a wicket gate.[8]
  • c. 1225 – a small door or gate (King Horn).[3]
  • 1296 – a small opening, a loophole or grille.[5]
  • 1573 – slang, the mouth.[19]
  • 1662 – cricket, the stumps and bails.[5]
  • 1738 – cricket, a batsman's tenure of the wicket.[5]
  • 1813 – a window with a grille.[3]
  • 1862 – cricket, the pitch.[5]
  • 1868 – US, a croquet hoop.[5]
  • 1875 – a small sluice gate in a canal lock.[5]
  • 1941 – on a good wicket, in a favourable position.[5]

Meanings

Noun

  1. A small door or gate, especially one set in or beside a larger one.[18][4][5]
  2. (chiefly US) A small window or opening with a grille, as at a ticket office or bank.[18][4][7]
  3. A small sluice gate, as in a canal lock or the chute of a waterwheel.[18][5]
  4. (US) A croquet hoop.[18][5]
  5. (cricket) Either of the two sets of three stumps topped by two bails, at which the bowler aims and which the batsman defends.[18][5][7]
  6. (cricket) The strip of ground between the wickets; the pitch.[5]
  7. (cricket) A batsman's turn at batting, or his dismissal: to take a wicket.[5][7]

Word family

  • single wicket
  • sticky wicket

References

  1. ^ Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
  2. ^ a b Kurath, Hans; Kuhn, Sherman M.; Lewis, Robert E., eds. (1952–2001), Middle English Dictionary, Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press; online edition ed. Frances McSparran et al. (2000–2018)
  3. ^ a b c d e f g h i Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
  4. ^ a b c d e Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
  5. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s t u v w x y z Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
  6. ^ a b c d e f g h Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
  7. ^ a b c d e f Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
  8. ^ a b Anglo-Norman Dictionary (AND2), Aberystwyth University, anglo-norman.net (2nd ed., 2005–)
  9. ^ Stevenson, Angus, ed. (2010), Oxford Dictionary of English, 3rd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
  10. ^ a b c Cresswell, Julia (2021), Oxford Dictionary of Word Origins, 3rd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
  11. ^ Dictionary.com Unabridged (2016), based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, New York: Random House
  12. ^ Random House Webster's Unabridged Dictionary (1999), 2nd ed., New York: Random House
  13. ^ The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (online 2024), 5th ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
  14. ^ Hoad, T. F., ed. (1986), The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology, Oxford: Clarendon Press
  15. ^ Skeat, Walter W. (1911), A Concise Etymological Dictionary of the English Language, new ed., Oxford: Clarendon Press
  16. ^ Weekley, Ernest (1921), An Etymological Dictionary of Modern English, London: John Murray
  17. ^ Benson, Larry D., Glossarial Concordance to Middle English (Chaucer, Gower), Johns Hopkins University, github.com/jhu-digital-manuscripts/gcme
  18. ^ a b c d e f Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins
  19. ^ a b Green, Jonathon (2010), Green's Dictionary of Slang, London: Chambers; digital ed. 2016–, https://greensdictofslang.com