entry
vehicle
/ˈviːɪkəl/A means of transport or medium of expression
From Proto-Indo-European *wegh- (To go).
from Latin vehiculum "means of transport, vehicle, carriage, conveyance,"
+1 more sourcefrom French véhicule (16c.)
+1 more sourceWord Ancestry
from Latin vehiculum "means of transport, vehicle, carriage, conveyance,"
+1 more sourcefrom French véhicule (16c.)
+1 more sourcePicture an ancient Latin cart creaking along a dusty road: its name was vehiculum, from vehere, “to carry.” That same old motion-root eventually produced English vehicle—but also wagon and wain, distant Germanic cousins separated by centuries of linguistic travel. Wain nearly disappeared from everyday speech around 1600, surviving mainly in poetry and in Charles’s Wain, the old name for the Big Dipper. When vehicle entered English in the 1610s, it was broader than a car: a medicine’s liquid carrier, or even a medium for expressing an idea, could be a vehicle. So a vehicle is not merely something with wheels; it is anything that carries something else from one place—or one mind—to another.
The Story
Picture an ancient Latin cart creaking along a dusty road: its name was vehiculum, from vehere, “to carry.” That same old motion-root eventually produced English vehicle—but also wagon and wain, distant Germanic cousins separated by centuries of linguistic travel. Wain nearly disappeared from everyday speech around 1600, surviving mainly in poetry and in Charles’s Wain, the old name for the Big Dipper. When vehicle entered English in the 1610s, it was broader than a car: a medicine’s liquid carrier, or even a medium for expressing an idea, could be a vehicle. So a vehicle is not merely something with wheels; it is anything that carries something else from one place—or one mind—to another.
Kin & Kindred
From '*wegh-'·To go, move, or transport in a vehicle
Derived Terms
English words from this root
Sources
Free Dictionary
Wikipedia
Wiktionary