Unnumbered source etymology
Original entry ↗The sister or sister-in-law of one’s parent. · The female cousin or cousin-in-law of one’s parent. · A woman of an older generation than oneself, especially a friend of one's parents, by means of fictive kin. · Any elderly woman.
From Middle English aunte, from Anglo-Norman aunte, from Old French ante, from Latin amita (“father's sister”). Displaced native Middle English modrie (“aunt”) (from Old English mōdriġe (“maternal aunt”); compare Old English faþu, faþe (“paternal aunt”)). Notes on pronunciation and spelling The digraph ⟨au⟩ representing /æ ~ ɑː/ (rather than /ɔː/) is irregular. It likely reflects a development of Middle English /au̯/ to [aː~æː] before /m n/ in some varieties of Early Modern English, which later came to be identified with either /æ/ or [æː] from pre-fricative lengthening (in the latter case, creating a phoneme /æː/; this is the basis of the bath lexical set). Such pronunciations historically competed with more learned ones where /au̯/ underwent its normal development to /ɔː/, with the standard language eventually adopting /æ ~ ɑː/ in words that came to be spelt with ⟨a⟩ and /ɔː/ in those which came to be spelt with ⟨au⟩ except in this word. However, dialects may have /æ/ or /ɑː/ in other words such as launch, especially in the UK. An alternative explanation derives /æ ~ ɑː/ in this word (and other instances of bath before /m n/) from a collateral Middle English form with /a/, which would've undergone lengthening before nasals analogous to that occuring before fricatives. Though such a collateral form may be ancestral to pronunciations with /a ~ æ/ in some varieties, this hypothesis cannot explain why inherited instances of bath before /m n/ only derive from Middle English words which had variants in /au̯m au̯n/.
Relationships mentioned by the source
These are extracted mentions, not a timeline or a verified sequence of immediate parents.
This page abbreviates 1 auxiliary source items. The etymology narrative is not shortened. Omission counts are available in the audit fields below; consult the original for complete auxiliary material.
Inspect preserved source fields
Raw extraction fields are retained for auditing. Their order does not establish ancestry.
{
"templates": [
{
"name": "inh",
"args": {
"1": "en",
"2": "enm",
"3": "aunte"
},
"expansion": "Middle English aunte"
},
{
"name": "der",
"args": {
"1": "en",
"2": "xno",
"3": "aunte"
},
"expansion": "Anglo-Norman aunte"
},
{
"name": "der",
"args": {
"1": "en",
"2": "fro",
"3": "ante"
},
"expansion": "Old French ante"
},
{
"name": "der",
"args": {
"1": "en",
"2": "la",
"3": "amita",
"4": "",
"5": "father's sister"
},
"expansion": "Latin amita (“father's sister”)"
},
{
"name": "cog",
"args": {
"1": "enm",
"2": "modrie",
"3": "",
"4": "aunt"
},
"expansion": "Middle English modrie (“aunt”)"
},
{
"name": "cog",
"args": {
"1": "ang",
"2": "mōdriġe",
"3": "",
"4": "maternal aunt"
},
"expansion": "Old English mōdriġe (“maternal aunt”)"
},
{
"name": "cog",
"args": {
"1": "ang",
"2": "",
"3": "faþu, faþe",
"4": "paternal aunt"
},
"expansion": "Old English faþu, faþe (“paternal aunt”)"
},
{
"name": "col-top",
"args": {
"1": "2",
"2": "Notes on pronunciation and spelling"
},
"expansion": "Notes on pronunciation and spelling"
},
{
"name": "orth",
"args": {
"1": "au"
},
"expansion": "⟨au⟩"
},
{
"name": "smallcaps",
"args": {
"1": "bath"
},
"expansion": "bath"
},
{
"name": "orth",
"args": {
"1": "a"
},
"expansion": "⟨a⟩"
},
{
"name": "orth",
"args": {
"1": "au"
},
"expansion": "⟨au⟩"
},
{
"name": "smallcaps",
"args": {
"1": "bath"
},
"expansion": "bath"
},
{
"name": "smallcaps",
"args": {
"1": "bath"
},
"expansion": "bath"
}
],
"links": [
[
"aunte",
"aunte#Middle_English"
],
[
"aunte",
"aunte#Old_French"
],
[
"ante",
"ante#Old_French"
],
[
"amita",
"amita#Latin"
],
[
"modrie",
"modrie#Middle_English"
],
[
"mōdriġe",
"modrige#Old_English"
],
[
"faþu",
"faþu#Old English"
],
[
"faþe",
"faþe#Old English"
],
[
"launch",
"launch#English"
]
],
"references": [],
"descendants": [
{
"lang": "Hawaiian",
"lang_code": "haw",
"word": "ʻanakē",
"raw_tags": [
"borrowed"
]
},
{
"lang": "Irish",
"lang_code": "ga",
"word": "aint",
"raw_tags": [
"borrowed"
]
},
{
"lang": "Pennsylvania German",
"lang_code": "pdc",
"word": "Aent",
"raw_tags": [
"borrowed"
]
},
{
"lang": "Yoruba",
"lang_code": "yo",
"word": "àǹtí",
"raw_tags": [
"borrowed"
]
}
],
"lexical": [
{
"pos": "noun",
"glosses": [
"The sister or sister-in-law of one’s parent.",
"The female cousin or cousin-in-law of one’s parent.",
"A woman of an older generation than oneself, especially a friend of one's parents, by means of fictive kin.",
"Any elderly woman."
],
"tags": [
"endearing",
"obsolete"
],
"recordId": "231d87717c245c8ded9dca7872256538b9b72e04c36954b5bf07bc0b67ab3c34",
"rawRecordSha256": "664a7b8293ac02dc1ad88b09e0fb7c88434bce3e5901947ffa39be51e0937685",
"sourceRecordOrdinal": 18036
}
],
"omittedAuxiliaryFields": {
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"lexicalRecords": 0,
"lexicalSenses": 1,
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}
}