autumn
/ˈɔːtəm/noun
Season between summer and winter
From Latin, ultimate origin uncertain autumn (Autumn or the season after summer).
Lineage
The story
For much of English history, people called this season harvest, a practical name for the period of gathering crops. Then, in the late 14th century, English borrowed autumpne from French, which had inherited it from Latin autumnus. Here comes the surprising part: unlike summer, winter, and spring, autumn has no securely reconstructed Indo-European ancestor; scholars have even suggested an Etruscan source, perhaps connected with Vertumnus, the deity of Rome’s changing year. The Latin form may also have been nudged by auctus, “increase,” possibly evoking the season’s ripening abundance. North Americans later popularized fall, a vivid reference to falling leaves, while autumn remained the more international form. So when autumn arrives, the word itself is changing history in miniature: a mysterious foreign name replacing harvest, while the trees perform the translation in red and gold.
Words from the same roots
autumn · Latin, ultimate origin uncertain, ‘Autumn or the season after summer’
Derivedautumnal, fall, harvest, equinox, autumnal equinox