Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • adjective Of or relating to etymology or based on the principles of etymology.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • adjective Pertaining to etymology, or the derivation of words.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • adjective not comparable Of or relating to etymology.
  • adjective comparable, of a word Consistent with its etymological characteristics (in historical usage and/or the source language).

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

  • adjective based on or belonging to etymology

Etymologies

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

etymology +‎ -ical

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Examples

  • The word chowder has its etymological roots in the Latin word caldaria, meaning a place to warm things and later a cooking pot.

    Cook sister! 2009

  • Incidentally, Tennyson’s “samite” (inMorte d’Arthur, as worn by the disembodied arm that belongs to the Lady of the Lake) was a brilliantly contrived exercise in etymological archaeology, and strictly speakingmeant (via the Latin samitum and, in turn, the Greek hexamiton) a six-ply silk brocade incorporating gold and silver threads, much in vogue during the Middle Ages, but let us not be deflected.

    Further Pavlova 2009

  • Incidentally, Tennyson’s “samite” (inMorte d’Arthur, as worn by the disembodied arm that belongs to the Lady of the Lake) was a brilliantly contrived exercise in etymological archaeology, and strictly speakingmeant (via the Latin samitum and, in turn, the Greek hexamiton) a six-ply silk brocade incorporating gold and silver threads, much in vogue during the Middle Ages, but let us not be deflected.

    Archive 2009-05-01 2009

  • Ne + cedere is the root = “not” + “withdraw” — in other words the etymological premise of the idea in the word is a PRESUMPTION of deference or cession of power, which cession or deference is foregone or abandoned ONLY in the “necessary” case and then only to the degree “proper” or “belonging to” the isolated occasion or circumstance giving rise to the necessity that overcomes the presumption.

    The Volokh Conspiracy » The proper understanding of “Necessary and Proper”: 2009

  • One of the things I've found irritating about Japanese kokugo-jiten is the absence of the kind of etymological information we take for granted in most of our English dictionaries.

    languagehat.com: JAPANESE ETYMOLOGICAL DICTIONARY. 2005

  • I wouldn’t blame you; this is a commonly-held belief known as the etymological fallacy.

    2010 January « Motivated Grammar 2010

  • I wouldn’t blame you; this is a commonly-held belief known as the etymological fallacy.

    Some words whose meanings have changed without controversy « Motivated Grammar 2010

  • Martin accuses the English translators of interpreting such words in their "etymological" sense, and consulting profane writers, Homer,

    Early Theories of Translation Flora Ross Amos

  • It has divided Ruthenian writers into two great camps: the "etymological", which retains the old system of spelling, and the "phonetic", which advocates the new system.

    The Catholic Encyclopedia, Volume 13: Revelation-Stock 1840-1916 1913

  • I cannot crawl into the minds of the youngest generation of psychologists to learn whether exceptional still carries what I must regard, personally, to be the unconscionable semantic distortion, both denotative and connotative, introduced a generation ago using "etymological" grounds for justification.

    VERBATIM: The Language Quarterly Vol XVIII No 1 1991

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