English
profile
Profile comes from French profil, from Italian profilo, from profilare ‘to outline’, from pro- + filare ‘to draw a line’.
- Italianc. 1300–presentfilare‘to spin, draw a line’
- Italian, derivedc. 1300–presentprofilare‘to outline’
- Italian, derivedc. 1300–presentprofilo‘profile’
- Frenchc. 1600–presentprofil
- Englishearliest quotation 1984profile
attested reconstructed ? uncertain or disputed
Lineage
- Italianc. 1300–presentfilare‘to spin, draw a line’
- Italian, derivedc. 1300–presentprofilare‘to outline’
- Italian, derivedc. 1300–presentprofilo‘profile’
- Frenchc. 1600–presentprofil
- Englishearliest quotation 1984profile
Earliest quotation: 1984, Warren Blumenfeld, Boston's Other Voice: “The book The Men with the Pink Triangles, profiling…”
A compound of pro ‘before’ + filo ‘a line, stroke, thread’
Proto-Indo-European *pró ‘toward’
Proto-Italic *prō ‘for’
Latin pro ‘before’
Proto-Indo-European *gʷʰiH-(s-)lo- ‘sinew’
Proto-Italic *fī(s)lom
Latin fīlum ‘thread’
Latin filo ‘a line, stroke, thread’
Every English word from Italian filare
Today it means
noun The outermost shape, view, or edge of an object.
Language periods are conventional ranges, not dates for this word.
Etymograph / Italian filare / profile