Etymology of what

The source reports below are imported and unreviewed by *SET-U. Separate numbered origins and differing source variants are preserved; agreement within this extraction is not independent corroboration.

Unnumbered source etymology

Original entry ↗

pron

Which thing, event, circumstance, etc.: used in asking for the specification of an identity, quantity, quality, etc. · That which; those that; the thing(s) that. · Anything that; all that; whatever. · That; which; who.

det

Which, especially which of an open-ended set of possibilities. · Which. · Any ... that; all ... that; whatever. · Emphasises that something is noteworthy or remarkable in quality or degree, in either a good or bad way; may be used in combination with certain other determiners, especially 'a', less often 'some'.

intj

An expression of surprise or disbelief. · What do you want? An abrupt, usually unfriendly enquiry as to what a person desires. · Clipping of what do you say?, used as a type of tag question to emphasise a statement and invite agreement, often rhetorically. · What did you say? I beg your pardon? This usage is often considered impolite, with the more polite "Pardon?" or "Excuse me?" preferred.

noun

Something; thing; stuff. · The identity of a thing, as an answer to a question of what. · Something that is addressed by what, as opposed to a person, addressed by who.

adv

In what way; to what extent. · Used before a prepositional phrase to emphasise that something is taken into consideration as a cause or reason; usually used in combination with 'with' (see what with), and much less commonly with other prepositions.

particle

Emphasizes the truth of an assertion made to contradict an evidently false assumption held by the listener. · Used to invite agreement or acknowledgment when something is assumed to be straightforward or already obvious to begin with; similar in function to “right?” and “as you know”. · Used after a direct assertion to reinforce a disagreeing opinion.

Selected source glosses provide context, not a complete modern definition inventory

Etymology tree Proto-Indo-European *kʷ- Proto-Indo-European *kʷís Proto-Germanic *hwat Proto-West Germanic *hwat Old English hwæt Middle English what English what From Middle English what, from Old English hwæt (“what”), from Proto-West Germanic *hwat, from Proto-Germanic *hwat (“what”), from Proto-Indo-European *kʷód (“what”), neuter form of *kʷós (“who”). Cognate with Scots what, whit (“what”), North Frisian wat (“what”), Saterland Frisian wat (“what”), West Frisian wat (“what”), Dutch wat (“what”), Low German wat (“what”), German was (“what”), Danish hvad (“what”), Norwegian Bokmål hva (“what”), Swedish vad (“what”), Norwegian Nynorsk kva (“what”), Icelandic hvað (“what”), Latin quod (“what, which”). Its use as a particle of contradiction or objection in colloquial Malaysian and Singaporean Englishes is analogous to Malay apa and Cantonese 喎 /㖞 (wo³, etymology 2, sense 3). It is possible that this was historically reinforced by the dated use of what as a sentence-final question tag in British English.

Relationships mentioned by the source

These are extracted mentions, not a timeline or a verified sequence of immediate parents.

Root classification mention*kʷ-ine-pro
Inherited-form mentionwhatenm
Inherited-form mentionhwætang
Inherited-form mention*hwatgmw-pro
Inherited-form mention*hwatgem-pro
Inherited-form mention*kʷódine-pro
Cognate mentionwhatsco
Cognate mentionwatfrr
Cognate mentionwatstq
Cognate mentionwatfy
Cognate mentionwatnl
Cognate mentionwatnds
Cognate mentionwasde
Cognate mentionhvadda
Cognate mentionhvanb
Cognate mentionvadsv
Cognate mentionkvann
Cognate mentionhvaðis
Cognate mentionquodla
Semantic-loan mentionapams
Semantic-loan mention喎yue

This page abbreviates 2 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": "etymon",
      "args": {
        "1": "en",
        "2": ":inh",
        "3": "enm:what",
        "tree": "1"
      },
      "expansion": "Etymology tree\nProto-Indo-European *kʷ-\nProto-Indo-European *kʷís\nProto-Germanic *hwat\nProto-West Germanic *hwat\nOld English hwæt\nMiddle English what\nEnglish what\n[Appendix:Glossary#inherited|Inherited]] from\", \"keyword\" : \"inherited\" } ], \"lang_name\" : \"Proto-Germanic\", \"term\" : \"*hwat\", \"status\" : \"ok\", \"lang\" : \"gem-pro\" } ], \"keyword_label\" : \"Inherited from\", \"keyword\" : \"inherited\" } ], \"lang_name\" : \"Proto-West Germanic\", \"term\" : \"*hwat\", \"status\" : \"ok\", \"lang\" : \"gmw-pro\" } ], \"keyword_label\" : \"Inherited from\", \"keyword\" : \"inherited\" } ], \"lang_name\" : \"Old English\", \"term\" : \"hwæt\", \"status\" : \"ok\", \"lang\" : \"ang\" } ], \"keyword_label\" : \"Inherited from\", \"keyword\" : \"inherited\" } ], \"lang_name\" : \"Middle English\", \"term\" : \"what\", \"status\" : \"ok\", \"lang\" : \"enm\" } ], \"keyword_label\" : \"Inherited from\", \"keyword\" : \"inherited\" } ], \"lang_name\" : \"English\", \"term\" : \"what\", \"status\" : \"ok\", \"lang\" : \"en\" }\" data-lang=\"en\" data-title=\"what\">"
    },
    {
      "name": "root",
      "args": {
        "1": "en",
        "2": "ine-pro",
        "3": "*kʷ-"
      },
      "expansion": ""
    },
    {
      "name": "inh",
      "args": {
        "1": "en",
        "2": "enm",
        "3": "what"
      },
      "expansion": "Middle English what"
    },
    {
      "name": "inh",
      "args": {
        "1": "en",
        "2": "ang",
        "3": "hwæt",
        "4": "",
        "5": "what"
      },
      "expansion": "Old English hwæt (“what”)"
    },
    {
      "name": "inh",
      "args": {
        "1": "en",
        "2": "gmw-pro",
        "3": "*hwat"
      },
      "expansion": "Proto-West Germanic *hwat"
    },
    {
      "name": "inh",
      "args": {
        "1": "en",
        "2": "gem-pro",
        "3": "*hwat",
        "4": "",
        "5": "what"
      },
      "expansion": "Proto-Germanic *hwat (“what”)"
    },
    {
      "name": "inh",
      "args": {
        "1": "en",
        "2": "ine-pro",
        "3": "*kʷód",
        "4": "",
        "5": "what"
      },
      "expansion": "Proto-Indo-European *kʷód (“what”)"
    },
    {
      "name": "cog",
      "args": {
        "1": "sco",
        "2": "what"
      },
      "expansion": "Scots what"
    },
    {
      "name": "cog",
      "args": {
        "1": "frr",
        "2": "wat",
        "3": "",
        "4": "what"
      },
      "expansion": "North Frisian wat (“what”)"
    },
    {
      "name": "cog",
      "args": {
        "1": "stq",
        "2": "wat",
        "3": "",
        "4": "what"
      },
      "expansion": "Saterland Frisian wat (“what”)"
    },
    {
      "name": "cog",
      "args": {
        "1": "fy",
        "2": "wat",
        "3": "",
        "4": "what"
      },
      "expansion": "West Frisian wat (“what”)"
    },
    {
      "name": "cog",
      "args": {
        "1": "nl",
        "2": "wat",
        "3": "",
        "4": "what"
      },
      "expansion": "Dutch wat (“what”)"
    },
    {
      "name": "cog",
      "args": {
        "1": "nds",
        "2": "wat",
        "3": "",
        "4": "what"
      },
      "expansion": "Low German wat (“what”)"
    },
    {
      "name": "cog",
      "args": {
        "1": "de",
        "2": "was",
        "3": "",
        "4": "what"
      },
      "expansion": "German was (“what”)"
    },
    {
      "name": "cog",
      "args": {
        "1": "da",
        "2": "hvad",
        "3": "",
        "4": "what"
      },
      "expansion": "Danish hvad (“what”)"
    },
    {
      "name": "cog",
      "args": {
        "1": "nb",
        "2": "hva",
        "3": "",
        "4": "what"
      },
      "expansion": "Norwegian Bokmål hva (“what”)"
    },
    {
      "name": "cog",
      "args": {
        "1": "sv",
        "2": "vad",
        "3": "",
        "4": "what"
      },
      "expansion": "Swedish vad (“what”)"
    },
    {
      "name": "cog",
      "args": {
        "1": "nn",
        "2": "kva",
        "3": "",
        "4": "what"
      },
      "expansion": "Norwegian Nynorsk kva (“what”)"
    },
    {
      "name": "cog",
      "args": {
        "1": "is",
        "2": "hvað",
        "3": "",
        "4": "what"
      },
      "expansion": "Icelandic hvað (“what”)"
    },
    {
      "name": "cog",
      "args": {
        "1": "la",
        "2": "quod",
        "3": "",
        "4": "what, which"
      },
      "expansion": "Latin quod (“what, which”)"
    },
    {
      "name": "glossary",
      "args": {
        "1": "semantic loan",
        "2": "analogous"
      },
      "expansion": "analogous"
    },
    {
      "name": "sl",
      "args": {
        "1": "en",
        "2": "ms",
        "3": "apa",
        "nocap": "1",
        "notext": "1"
      },
      "expansion": "Malay apa"
    },
    {
      "name": "sl",
      "args": {
        "1": "en",
        "2": "yue",
        "3": "喎",
        "tr": "wo³",
        "pos": "etymology 2, sense 3",
        "nocap": "1",
        "notext": "1"
      },
      "expansion": "Cantonese 喎 /㖞 (wo³, etymology 2, sense 3)"
    },
    {
      "name": "etymon",
      "args": {
        "1": "en",
        "2": ":inh",
        "3": "enm:what",
        "tree": "1"
      },
      "expansion": "Etymology tree\nProto-Indo-European *kʷ-\nProto-Indo-European *kʷís\nProto-Germanic *hwat\nProto-West Germanic *hwat\nOld English hwæt\nMiddle English what\nEnglish what"
    }
  ],
  "links": [
    [
      "*kʷ-",
      "Reconstruction:Proto-Indo-European/kʷ-#Proto-Indo-European:_interrogative_root"
    ],
    [
      "*kʷís",
      "Reconstruction:Proto-Indo-European/kʷís"
    ],
    [
      "*hwat",
      "Reconstruction:Proto-Germanic/hwat"
    ],
    [
      "*hwat",
      "Reconstruction:Proto-West Germanic/hwat"
    ],
    [
      "hwæt",
      "hwæt#Old_English"
    ],
    [
      "what",
      "what#Middle_English"
    ],
    [
      "what",
      "what#Middle_English"
    ],
    [
      "hwæt",
      "hwæt#Old_English"
    ],
    [
      "*hwat",
      "Reconstruction:Proto-West Germanic/hwat"
    ],
    [
      "*hwat",
      "Reconstruction:Proto-Germanic/hwat"
    ],
    [
      "*kʷód",
      "Reconstruction:Proto-Indo-European/kʷód"
    ],
    [
      "*kʷós",
      "Reconstruction:Proto-Indo-European/kʷós"
    ],
    [
      "what",
      "what#Scots"
    ],
    [
      "whit",
      "whit#Scots"
    ],
    [
      "wat",
      "wat#North_Frisian"
    ],
    [
      "wat",
      "wat#Saterland_Frisian"
    ],
    [
      "wat",
      "wat#West_Frisian"
    ],
    [
      "wat",
      "wat#Dutch"
    ],
    [
      "wat",
      "wat#Low_German"
    ],
    [
      "was",
      "was#German"
    ],
    [
      "hvad",
      "hvad#Danish"
    ],
    [
      "hva",
      "hva#Norwegian_Bokmål"
    ],
    [
      "vad",
      "vad#Swedish"
    ],
    [
      "kva",
      "kva#Norwegian_Nynorsk"
    ],
    [
      "hvað",
      "hvað#Icelandic"
    ],
    [
      "quod",
      "quod#Latin"
    ],
    [
      "use as a particle of contradiction or objection",
      "what#Particle"
    ],
    [
      "apa",
      "apa#Malay"
    ],
    [
      "喎",
      "喎#Cantonese"
    ],
    [
      "㖞",
      "㖞#Cantonese"
    ],
    [
      "what as a sentence-final question tag",
      "what#English:_tag-question"
    ]
  ],
  "references": [],
  "descendants": [],
  "lexical": [
    {
      "pos": "pron",
      "glosses": [
        "Which thing, event, circumstance, etc.: used in asking for the specification of an identity, quantity, quality, etc.",
        "That which; those that; the thing(s) that.",
        "Anything that; all that; whatever.",
        "That; which; who."
      ],
      "tags": [
        "interrogative",
        "dialectal",
        "nonstandard",
        "relative"
      ],
      "recordId": "31dc485055629b8fd3dfe659bc8bba533f1df0ca9a87190c5e4caffe3aab2c17",
      "rawRecordSha256": "f8bd397059e624e5ad3b1c8c03b10dae72440ad4371675bddb29fe4b57e9f33f",
      "sourceRecordOrdinal": 17873
    },
    {
      "pos": "det",
      "glosses": [
        "Which, especially which of an open-ended set of possibilities.",
        "Which.",
        "Any ... that; all ... that; whatever.",
        "Emphasises that something is noteworthy or remarkable in quality or degree, in either a good or bad way; may be used in combination with certain other determiners, especially 'a', less often 'some'."
      ],
      "tags": [
        "interrogative",
        "indirect",
        "relative"
      ],
      "recordId": "469fb889efab8dcbd7d4a00a06cef1ddda8e421da2212169aa1e9451ff93bc0f",
      "rawRecordSha256": "78aed196efa8a188c15f7ad77199ee2fae01f43bdf55147825b0d100c165f048",
      "sourceRecordOrdinal": 17872
    },
    {
      "pos": "intj",
      "glosses": [
        "An expression of surprise or disbelief.",
        "What do you want? An abrupt, usually unfriendly enquiry as to what a person desires.",
        "Clipping of what do you say?, used as a type of tag question to emphasise a statement and invite agreement, often rhetorically.",
        "What did you say? I beg your pardon? This usage is often considered impolite, with the more polite \"Pardon?\" or \"Excuse me?\" preferred."
      ],
      "tags": [
        "UK",
        "abbreviation",
        "alt-of",
        "clipping",
        "colloquial",
        "dated"
      ],
      "recordId": "61c972ec1cda09878cb362670aecdb660d83b0ec612c94bd9581aeb3820246bd",
      "rawRecordSha256": "f41e8bb71bdab2d870669c78502990b462c58569cd77e537658d6026eb35bded",
      "sourceRecordOrdinal": 17875
    },
    {
      "pos": "noun",
      "glosses": [
        "Something; thing; stuff.",
        "The identity of a thing, as an answer to a question of what.",
        "Something that is addressed by what, as opposed to a person, addressed by who."
      ],
      "tags": [
        "obsolete",
        "uncountable",
        "countable"
      ],
      "recordId": "a758aacad208be4fa30034d83d7f1f8f3bd871bb23132e8040b2e76e2f39317b",
      "rawRecordSha256": "536c1337f659a3658b00017203a054011e89a028c4882a02c3d92b05187935dc",
      "sourceRecordOrdinal": 17876
    },
    {
      "pos": "adv",
      "glosses": [
        "In what way; to what extent.",
        "Used before a prepositional phrase to emphasise that something is taken into consideration as a cause or reason; usually used in combination with 'with' (see what with), and much less commonly with other prepositions."
      ],
      "tags": [
        "interrogative",
        "not-comparable"
      ],
      "recordId": "adf075b369a7e51651b581a72650daafe2a7f3e4e985236a8c019b4f49028596",
      "rawRecordSha256": "bf6c04ac5a3c7245b450dde3d288cf57555e7bb68c5b4dfa55669e9bc0c13bf1",
      "sourceRecordOrdinal": 17874
    },
    {
      "pos": "particle",
      "glosses": [
        "Emphasizes the truth of an assertion made to contradict an evidently false assumption held by the listener.",
        "Used to invite agreement or acknowledgment when something is assumed to be straightforward or already obvious to begin with; similar in function to “right?” and “as you know”.",
        "Used after a direct assertion to reinforce a disagreeing opinion."
      ],
      "tags": [
        "Manglish",
        "Singlish"
      ],
      "recordId": "c2a591c13f76565d229962bd086e749dbca84a28566826a3b144f642a448708d",
      "rawRecordSha256": "62256df2d692ed58b88def5aa20880b0f1bbbb78d450cf78e6d566c25aa14f72",
      "sourceRecordOrdinal": 17877
    }
  ],
  "omittedAuxiliaryFields": {
    "templates": 0,
    "links": 0,
    "references": 0,
    "descendants": 0,
    "lexicalRecords": 0,
    "lexicalSenses": 2,
    "glosses": 0
  }
}

The source etymologies

Unnumbered source etymology

Relationships mentioned by the source

Where this record stops

Source and snapshot