English

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Etymology

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US English, 1848,[1] probably from older forms such as "How comes it that... ?" or "How does it come that... ?" and "How did it come to be like this?"[2]

Compare West Frisian hoe kom (how come), Dutch hoe komt het (how comes it; why), Afrikaans hoekom (how come; why).

Pronunciation

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Adverb

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how come

  1. (idiomatic, informal) Why; why is it; for what reason or purpose; due to what cause?
    Synonym: why come
    How come you didn’t leave when you had the chance?

Usage notes

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How come differs from why in that the word order of the question is the same as that of a statement. Compare:

You left. (statement)
How come you left? (statement order)
Why did you leave? (question order)

Synonyms

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Translations

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References

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  1. ^ Eric Partridge (2005) “how come?”, in Tom Dalzell and Terry Victor, editors, The New Partridge Dictionary of Slang and Unconventional English, volume 1 (A–I), London, New York, N.Y.: Routledge, →ISBN, page 1044.
  2. ^ Hegedűs, Irén; Fodor, Alexandra (2010): English Historical Linguistics 2010: Selected Papers from the Sixteenth International Conference on English Historical Linguistics, p. 179.