stamina
/ˈstæmɪnə/noun
physical or mental strength to sustain prolonged effort
From Latin stāmen (thread).
Lineage
LatinGermanicnot directly attestedSelect a stage for details, or drag it
The story
Picture a loom: the warp threads run taut beneath the cloth, holding the whole fabric together. Latin called a thread or warp a stāmen, and its plural, stāmina, entered English in the 1670s for the basic elements that support something. The metaphor then shifted from cloth to life: people once imagined a person’s inborn vital capacities as the threads on which the length of life depended. By 1726, stamina had acquired its familiar sense of endurance. The same thread-image also brushes against the Fates, whose spun thread stood for a human life—so stamina is, at heart, the strength of the strands holding you together.