entry
call
/kɔːl/; /kɔl/; /kɑːl/To shout, summon, name, or communicate by voice
From Proto-Indo-European, through Proto-Germanic and Old Norse gel (to call).
from PIE root *gal- "to call, shout." Related: Called ; calling . Old English cognate ceallian "to shout, utter in a...
from Proto-Germanic *kall- , which is reconstructed to be
+1 more sourcefrom Old Norse kalla "cry loudly, summon in a loud voice; name, call by name," reconstructed to be
from Middle English callen
Word Ancestry
from PIE root *gal- "to call, shout." Related: Called ; calling . Old English cognate ceallian "to shout, utter in a...
from Proto-Germanic *kall- , which is reconstructed to be
+1 more sourcefrom Old Norse kalla "cry loudly, summon in a loud voice; name, call by name," reconstructed to be
from Middle English callen
Long before a telephone existed, calling meant making enough noise for another human being to notice: a shout across a village, a summons at a doorway, a name thrown into the air. The word probably traveled through Proto-Germanic *kall- and Old Norse kalla, while a related Old English form, ċeallian, may also have helped Middle English callen take shape. By the 1590s, people could “call names,” turning the simple act of naming into an insult; by the 1670s, card players were calling for hands to be shown, and by 1889 poker players were calling bets. The telephone sense arrived in 1882, but the older image survives in “call in,” “call back,” and “call out”—all linguistic echoes of summoning someone loudly from a distance. The apparent root label “gel” can be misleading: this call is not related to modern gel, which comes from words for freezing and jelly; here, the memorable ancestral sound is a human cry—*gal*, a voice reaching across space.
The Story
Long before a telephone existed, calling meant making enough noise for another human being to notice: a shout across a village, a summons at a doorway, a name thrown into the air. The word probably traveled through Proto-Germanic *kall- and Old Norse kalla, while a related Old English form, ċeallian, may also have helped Middle English callen take shape. By the 1590s, people could “call names,” turning the simple act of naming into an insult; by the 1670s, card players were calling for hands to be shown, and by 1889 poker players were calling bets. The telephone sense arrived in 1882, but the older image survives in “call in,” “call back,” and “call out”—all linguistic echoes of summoning someone loudly from a distance. The apparent root label “gel” can be misleading: this call is not related to modern gel, which comes from words for freezing and jelly; here, the memorable ancestral sound is a human cry—*gal*, a voice reaching across space.
Modern Usage
A decision or judgment, as in “It’s my call,” or a prediction later credited as correct.
Notable References
- “It’s not my call” means that someone else has the authority to decide.
Kin & Kindred
From 'gel'·to call, shout, produce a voice
Derived Terms
English words from this root
Sources
Etymonline
Free Dictionary
Urban Dictionary
Wiktionary