Source etymology 1 · variant 1/2
Original entry ↗A burden; a weight to be carried. · A worry or concern to be endured, especially in the phrase a load off one's mind. · A certain number of articles or quantity of material that can be transported or processed at one time. · A quantity of washing put into a washing machine for a wash cycle.
The sense of “burden” first arose in the 13th century as a secondary meaning of Middle English lode, loade, which had the main significance of “way, course, journey”, from Old English lād (“course, journey; way, street, waterway; leading, carrying; maintenance, support”) (ultimately from Proto-Germanic *laidō (“leading, way”), Proto-Indo-European *leyt- (“to go, go forth, die”). Cognate with Middle Low German leide (“entourage, escort”), German Leite (“line, course, load”), Swedish led (“way, trail, line”), Icelandic leið (“way, course, route”). As such, load is a doublet of lode, which has preserved the older meaning. Most likely, the semantic extension of the Middle English substantive arose by conflation with the (etymologically unrelated) verb lade; however, Middle English lode occurs only as a substantive; the transitive verb load (“to charge with a load”) is recorded only in the 16th century (frequently in Shakespeare), and (except for the participle laden) has largely supplanted lade in modern English. For the meaning development from PIE, compare Latin carrus (whence carry) akin to currō.
Relationships mentioned by the source
These are extracted mentions, not a timeline or a verified sequence of immediate parents.
This page abbreviates 17 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": "lode"
},
"expansion": "Middle English lode"
},
{
"name": "inh",
"args": {
"1": "en",
"2": "ang",
"3": "lād",
"4": "",
"5": "course, journey; way, street, waterway; leading, carrying; maintenance, support"
},
"expansion": "Old English lād (“course, journey; way, street, waterway; leading, carrying; maintenance, support”)"
},
{
"name": "inh",
"args": {
"1": "en",
"2": "gem-pro",
"3": "*laidō",
"4": "",
"5": "leading, way"
},
"expansion": "Proto-Germanic *laidō (“leading, way”)"
},
{
"name": "der",
"args": {
"1": "en",
"2": "ine-pro",
"3": "*leyt-",
"4": "",
"5": "to go, go forth, die"
},
"expansion": "Proto-Indo-European *leyt- (“to go, go forth, die”)"
},
{
"name": "cog",
"args": {
"1": "gml",
"2": "leide",
"3": "",
"4": "entourage, escort"
},
"expansion": "Middle Low German leide (“entourage, escort”)"
},
{
"name": "cog",
"args": {
"1": "de",
"2": "Leite",
"3": "",
"4": "line, course, load"
},
"expansion": "German Leite (“line, course, load”)"
},
{
"name": "cog",
"args": {
"1": "sv",
"2": "led",
"3": "",
"4": "way, trail, line"
},
"expansion": "Swedish led (“way, trail, line”)"
},
{
"name": "cog",
"args": {
"1": "is",
"2": "leið",
"3": "",
"4": "way, course, route"
},
"expansion": "Icelandic leið (“way, course, route”)"
},
{
"name": "doublet",
"args": {
"1": "en",
"2": "lode",
"nocap": "1"
},
"expansion": "doublet of lode"
},
{
"name": "m+",
"args": {
"1": "la",
"2": "carrus"
},
"expansion": "Latin carrus"
}
],
"links": [
[
"lode",
"lode#Middle_English"
],
[
"loade",
"loade#Middle_English"
],
[
"lād",
"lad#Old_English"
],
[
"*laidō",
"Reconstruction:Proto-Germanic/laidō"
],
[
"*leyt-",
"Reconstruction:Proto-Indo-European/leyt-"
],
[
"leide",
"leide#Middle_Low_German"
],
[
"Leite",
"Leite#German"
],
[
"led",
"led#Swedish"
],
[
"leið",
"leið#Icelandic"
],
[
"lode",
"lode#English"
],
[
"lade",
"lade#English"
],
[
"laden",
"laden#English"
],
[
"lade",
"lade#English"
],
[
"carrus",
"carrus#Latin"
],
[
"carry",
"carry#English"
],
[
"currō",
"curro#Latin"
]
],
"references": [],
"descendants": [
{
"lang": "Irish",
"lang_code": "ga",
"word": "lód",
"raw_tags": [
"borrowed"
]
}
],
"lexical": [
{
"pos": "noun",
"glosses": [
"A burden; a weight to be carried.",
"A worry or concern to be endured, especially in the phrase a load off one's mind.",
"A certain number of articles or quantity of material that can be transported or processed at one time.",
"A quantity of washing put into a washing machine for a wash cycle."
],
"tags": [
"figuratively"
],
"recordId": "57e0cfc0a955a1bec1c76e390e64f763bc5a5636e62823cb9e94a6086d26b102",
"rawRecordSha256": "984987942f4d754b767140b7c3cdf83551b690e2e2962e638de7467b1f606ac5",
"sourceRecordOrdinal": 211840
}
],
"omittedAuxiliaryFields": {
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"descendants": 0,
"lexicalRecords": 0,
"lexicalSenses": 17,
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}
}