Etymology

Watson

Wat·son
W4A1T1S1O1N1

Today it means: Any character who acts as a catalyst for the detective protagonist's mental processes in a mystery story; a consciousness that is privy to facts in the case without being in on the conclusions drawn from them until the proper time. After William L. DeAndrea, discussing Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. Full definition →

Middle English sone ← Old English sunu ← Proto-West Germanic *sunu
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Watson · proper noun1

  1. EnglishWat
  2. Proto-Indo-European*sew-?
  3. Proto-Indo-European*sewH-
  4. Proto-Indo-European*suHnús
  5. Proto-Germanic*sunuz
  6. Proto-West Germanic*sunu
  7. Old Englishsunu
  8. Middle Englishsone
  9. English todayWatson

From Wat + -son.

Watson · noun2

From the character in the Sherlock Holmes series of detective stories.

Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.