Etymology
Etymology is the discipline that treats the origin and history of words, the description of the true origin of words [Donald, p. 162].
The term is usually used to study words' origins and history. So far as to say etymology gets its methods from linguistics, it may be defined as a branch of historical linguistics [Crystal, p. 175].
Etymology is the origin and history of a particular word, the branch of linguistics that studies the origin and history of a particular word. Every language has a vocabulary containing thousands or millions of words, and each word has its etymology [Trask, p. 60].
Etymology is the history of a linguistic form shown by tracing its evolution since its first recorded occurrence in the language, by identifying its similars in other languages, or by tracing it to a common ancestral form [Merriam-Webster Online Dictionary].
The term etymology is defined as the analysis of word histories and as a report of individual words' origin and historical development. Etymology has traditionally been concerned most especially with those areas where there is a doubt about a stage in a word’s history or where the documentary record fails us’. Words and lexicalized phrases and their origins and shifting meanings are significant concerns to professional lexicographers, historical linguists and philologists [Durkin, p. 183].
A chronological account of the appearance and development of a particular word, often denoting its spread from one language to another and its changes in form and meaning, are called etymology [Dictionary.com].
⠀ David Crystal. (2008). A Dictionary of Linguistics and Phonetics, 6th Edition. New-Jersey: Wiley-Blackwell.
⠀ Etymology. Dictionary.com. Retrieved from: [https://www.dictionary.com/browse/etymology].
⠀ Etymology. Merriam-Webster Online Dictionary. Retrieved from: [https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/etymology].
⠀ James Donald. (1874). Chambers's Etymological Dictionary of the English Language. Edinburgh: W. & R. Chambers.
⠀ Philip Durkin. (2009). The Oxford Guide to Etymology. Oxford/NY: Oxford University Press.