dagger

English

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A small and richly decorated Mughal-era dagger of North India (Louvre, Paris, MR 13434)

Etymology 1

Related to Old French dague (13th century), Occitan, Italian, Spanish daga, German Degen, Middle Low German dagge (“knife's point”), Old Norse daggardr, Welsh dager, dagr, Breton dac, Albanian thikë (“a knife, dagger”), thek (“to stab, to pierce with a sharp object”).

In English attested from the 1380s. The ultimate origin of the word is unclear.[1] suspects Celtic origin. Others have suggested derivation from an unattested Vulgar Latin *daca "Dacian [knife]", from the Latin adjective dācus[2]. Chastelain (Dictionaire etymologique, 1750) thought that French dague was a derivation from German dagge, dagen).

The knightly dagger evolves from the 12th century. Guillaume le Breton (died 1226) uses daca in his Philippide. Other Middle Latin forms include daga, dagga, dagha, dagger, daggerius, daggerium, dagarium, dagarius, diga[3]; the forms with -r- are late 14th century adoptions of the English word). OED points out that there is also an English verb dag (“to stab”) from which this could be a derivation, but the verb is attested only from about 1400.

Relation to Old Armenian դակու (daku, “adze, axe”) has also been suggested[4].

Pronunciation

Noun

dagger (plural daggers)

  1. (weapon) A stabbing weapon, similar to a sword but with a short, double-edged blade.
    • 1599, William Shakespeare, The Merry Wives of Windsor, Act I, Scene I, line 282.
      I bruised my shin th’ other day with playing at sword and dagger with a master of fence; ...
    • 1786, Francis Grose, A Treatise on Ancient Armour and Weapons, page 34.
      The dagger, under the title cultellum and misericorde, has been the constant companion of the sword, at least from the days of Edward I. and is mentioned in the statute of Winchester.
  2. The text character (†).
Synonyms
Derived terms
Translations
a stabbing weapon
a text character
anything that causes pain like a dagger
The translations below need to be checked and inserted above into the appropriate translation tables, removing any numbers. Numbers do not necessarily match those in definitions. See instructions at Help:How to check translations.
Translations to be checked
See also

Verb

dagger (third-person singular simple present daggers, present participle daggering, simple past and past participle daggered)

  1. To pierce with a dagger; to stab.

Etymology 2

Perhaps from diagonal.

Noun

dagger (plural daggers)

  1. A timber placed diagonally in a ship's frame.
    (Can we find and add a quotation of Knight to this entry?)

Anagrams

References

  1. ^ Grimm
  2. ^ http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dacia
  3. ^ http://ducange.enc.sorbonne.fr/DAGGER
  4. ^ Hrach Martirosyan (2009), Etymological Dictionary of the Armenian Inherited Lexicon (Brill Academic Publishers), page 232
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Last modified on 21 May 2013, at 16:25