Etymograph

English

travel

Travel comes from Middle English travelen, an alteration of travaillen ‘to toil’, from Old French travailler ‘to trouble, suffer’.

  1. Old Frenchc. 842–1400travailler‘to trouble, suffer’
  2. Middle Englishc. 1150–1500travaillen‘to toil, work’
  3. Middle Scotsmoderntravailen‘to toil, work, travel’
  4. Middle Englishc. 1150–1500travelen‘to make a laborious journey’
  5. Englishearliest quotation 1596travel

attested reconstructed ? uncertain or disputed

Lineage

  1. Old Frenchc. 842–1400travailler‘to trouble, suffer’
  2. Middle Englishc. 1150–1500travaillen‘to toil, work’
  3. Middle Scotsmoderntravailen‘to toil, work, travel’
  4. Middle Englishc. 1150–1500travelen‘to make a laborious journey’
  5. Englishearliest quotation 1596travel

Earliest quotation: 1596, Edmund Spenser: “They shall not be travailed forth of their own…”

The story

Note the inverse semantic vectors: travel moves from a subjective state (toil) to an objective action (journey), while routine moves from an objective object (beaten path) to a subjective pattern (habit). Largely displaced native fare, from Old English faran (‘to go [a long distance], to travel’).

Linked words

through Proto-Indo-European *peh₂ǵ- ‘to attach, fix, fasten’

page, pole, propaganda, pale, compact, peasant, pagan, peel, propagate, pala, palisade, pectin, impinge, pagination, impactor, travail, 29 more

Another origin of travel

  1. Proto-Indo-Europeanc. 4500–2500 BCE*peh₂ǵ-‘to attach, fix, fasten’reconstructed
  2. Proto-Indo-European, derivedc. 4500–2500 BCE*peh₂ǵ-slosreconstructed
  3. Proto-Italicc. 1500–700 BCE*pākslosreconstructed
  4. Latinc. 75 BCE–200 CEpālus‘stake’
  5. Latin, derivedc. 75 BCE–200 CEtripālis‘composed of three stakes’
  6. Late Latinc. 200–600 CEtripālium‘torture device’
  7. Vulgar Latinc. 100–700 CE*tripāliāre‘to torment’reconstructed
  8. Old Frenchc. 842–1400travailler‘to torment oneself’
  9. Old French, derivedc. 842–1400travail‘suffering, torment’
  10. Middle Englishc. 1150–1500same form
  11. Englishtodaytravel

Today it means

verb To be on a journey, often for pleasure or business and with luggage; to go from one place to another.

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

Etymograph / Old French travailler / travel

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