Etymograph

English

plot

Plot comes from Old English plot ‘a plot of ground’.

  1. Old Englishc. 450–1150plot‘a plot of ground’
  2. Middle Englishc. 1150–1500same form
  3. Englishearliest quotation 1602same form

attested reconstructed ? uncertain or disputed

Lineage

  1. Old Englishc. 450–1150plot‘a plot of ground’
  2. Middle Englishc. 1150–1500same form
  3. Englishearliest quotation 1602same form

Earliest quotation: 1602, Richard Carew: “This treatise plotteth down Cornwall as it now standeth.”

The story

Perhaps from Proto-Germanic *plataz, *platjaz (‘a patch’); or alternatively, perhaps from a rebracketing of Old English land-splott (‘small portion, or plot, of ground’) taken as landes-plot (‘plot of land’).disputed Scholars disagree here; the competing view is quoted as the source gives it. Noun sense 12 is a back-formation from for the plot.

Every English word from Old English plot

Today it means

noun The course of a story, comprising a series of incidents which are gradually unfolded, sometimes by unexpected means.

Language periods are conventional ranges, not dates for this word.

Etymograph / Old English plot / plot

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