token
/ˈtoʊkən/noun, verb
A sign, symbol, keepsake, or representative object
From Proto-Indo-European *deik- / *deyḱ- (to show).
Lineage
The story
Picture an early Germanic speaker pointing dramatically at something and saying, in effect, “Look—this tells you something.” That gesture lies behind the reconstructed Proto-Indo-European root *deik-, “to show,” which produced both the ancestor of token and the ancestor of teach. In Old English, tācn meant a sign or symbol, while the related verb could mean “show,” “declare,” or “warn”—instruction originally began as pointing things out. By about 1200, token had expanded from an observable sign into a physical reminder or keepsake; by the 1590s, it could mean a stamped, coin-like piece. The phrase “by the same token,” recorded from the mid-15th century, preserves the older idea of a token as evidence: a little verbal sign saying, “This supports what I just told you.”
Modern usage
A deliberately stereotyped or supposedly representative person; also a game arcade coin, and in one entry a misspelling of Tolkien
- Popularized by
- South Park
- Heard in
- gaming · popular culture · informal slang
- See
- South Park character called Token in Urban Dictionary entries
Words from the same roots
*deik- / *deyḱ- · Proto-Indo-European, ‘to show, point out, instruct, teach’
Derivedteach, sign, indicate, token, German zeigen, German Zeichen, Dutch teken
CognatesIcelandic tákn