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windpipe

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Etymology and origin of the English word windpipe

Confidence
Established
Formation
Compound
First attested
1528 Paynell's translation of Arnaldus de Villa Nova More words from the 16th century
Ultimate origin
Old English wind,pipe
Etymology tree
inherited borrowed derived
English wind
English windpipe
From the same root
English rewind ← wind
English windmill ← wind
English windshield ← wind

Pronunciation

  • /ˈwɪndpaɪp/[1]

Etymology

It is formed from English wind + pipe,[2][3][4] with wind in its sense "breath".[3] Compare Dutch windpijpe (“air tube; trachea”), recorded for the trachea in the 16th century and now obsolete, and Middle Dutch wintpipe;[2] Old English had wind-ǣdre in the same sense.[2]

Earliest recorded meaning

Any tube that carries air in and out of the lungs, and specifically the trachea: 1528, in T. Paynell's translation of Arnaldus de Villa Nova.[2] Etymonline dates the word to the 1520s,[3] and Merriam-Webster gives 1530 as its first known use.[5]

Semantic evolution

Johnson (1755) defined the word as the passage for the breath, quoting Shakespeare's Henry V: "let not hemp his windpipe suffocate".[6] From 1688 the word was also used of a made pipe that carries a stream of air, as from a bellows or in a ventilation system.[2] G. Meredith's verb in The Amazing Marriage (1895), to utter or sing, may be a humorous play on the noun.[2]

Timeline

  • 1528 – a tube carrying air in and out of the lungs; the trachea.[2] Etymonline has the 1520s,[3] and Merriam-Webster 1530.[5]
  • 1688 – a pipe made to carry a flow of air.[2]
  • 1895 – verb, to utter or sing, in Meredith.[2]

Meanings

Noun

  1. The passage that carries air from the larynx to the lungs; the trachea: A crumb had gone down his windpipe.[5][2]
  2. A pipe made to carry a stream of air, for example from a bellows or as part of a ventilation system.[2]

References

  1. ^ Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
  2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
  3. ^ a b c d Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
  4. ^ Dictionary.com Unabridged (2016), based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, New York: Random House
  5. ^ a b c Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
  6. ^ Johnson, Samuel (1755), A Dictionary of the English Language, London; 4th ed. 1773; Johnson's Dictionary Online, ed. Beth Rapp Young et al.
Cite this entry

“Windpipe.” Etymologically, 5 Nov. 2026, etymologically.com/en/windpipe. Accessed 6 Nov. 2026.

Last edited on . ·