semantic
/sɪˈmæntɪk/adjective
relating to meaning, significance, or interpretation
From Greek sēma (sign).
Lineage
The story
A Greek sēma could be a sign, an omen, a constellation—or even a grave, a final marker in the landscape. From that vivid cluster came sēmantikós, “giving signs,” which eventually supplied English with semantic. The history has a small fork in the road: English semantick appears as early as 1665 for interpreting signs, but the modern linguistic sense arrived independently through French sémantique around 1890, after Michel Bréal named the field in 1883. Bréal’s 1897 book helped spread the term into English, where it escaped the classroom and entered everyday arguments about whether a disagreement is “just semantic.” So semantic began with signs pointing outward; today it often asks what those signs mean inside our heads.
Words from the same roots
sēma · Ancient Greek, ‘sign, mark, token, or indication’
Derivedsemiotic, semantics, semanticize, semaphore, significance