English
torch
Torch comes from Old French torche ‘bundle’.
- Old Frenchc. 842–1400torche1‘bundle’
- Middle Englishc. 1150–1500torch1‘large candle’
- Englishearliest quotation 1578torch1
attested reconstructed ? uncertain or disputed deepest recorded ancestor
- 1 Wiktionary, English torch
- Earliest quotation in Wiktionary’s entry: 1578, Rembert Dodoens, Of Plantayne or Waybrede: “Of this kinde, there is founde an other, the…”.
Earlier history uncertain. See Wiktionary.
Lineage
- Old Frenchc. 842–1400torcheWiktionary, English torch‘bundle’
- Middle Englishc. 1150–1500torchWiktionary, English torch‘large candle’
- Englishearliest quotation 1578torchWiktionary, English torch. Earliest quotation in Wiktionary’s entry: 1578, Rembert Dodoens, Of Plantayne or Waybrede: “Of this kinde, there is founde an other, the…”
The story
The noun is derived from Middle English torch, torche (‘large candle; lighted stick; (figurative) sunbeam’), from Old French torche, torque (‘torch; bundle of (twisted) straw’) (modern French torche); further etymology uncertain, probably from Vulgar Latin *torca (‘coiled object’) (referring to a torch made from twisted plant fibres dipped in a flammable substance such as pitch), from Latin torqua, a variant of torquis (‘collar of twisted metal, torque; wreath’), from torqueō (‘to twist, wind’), ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *terkʷ- (‘to spin; to turn’).uncertain The source flags this step as uncertain. Etymology 1 sense 2.3 (Verbascum thapsus) is either due to the plant’s spike of yellow flowers, or because its leaves and stalks were used to make torches (noun etymology 1 sense 1). Etymology 1 sense 3.2 (‘precious cause, etc., which needs to be protected and transmitted to others’) is derived from Latin lampada trādere, from Ancient Greek λᾰμπᾰ́δᾰ πᾰρᾰδιδόναι (lămpắdă părădidónai, “to hand over the torch”), a reference to the torch race held at various festivals such as the Panathenaic Games in Ancient Greece, which involved a relay where a torch was passed from one runner to another.
Linked words
through Proto-Indo-European *terkʷ- ‘to spin’
queer, torture, tart, torque, thwart, extortion, torment, distort, trowel, tort, torsion, 24 more
Today it means
noun A stick of wood or plant fibres twisted together, with one end soaked in a flammable substance such as resin or tallow and set on fire, which is held in the hand, put into a wall bracket, or stuck into the ground, and used chiefly as a light source.
Language periods are conventional ranges, not dates for this word.
Etymograph / Old French torche / torch