Etymology

landscape

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Today it means: A portion of land or territory as defined by its landform, its geographical (and architectural) features. Full definition →

Middle English *landschippe ← Old English landsċipe ← Dutch landschap
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The story

  1. Dutch · derived fromlandschap“region, district, province, landscape”
  2. Old English · inherited fromlandsċipe
  3. Middle English · inherited from*landschippe
  4. English todaylandscape

From an alteration (due to Dutch landschap) of earlier landskip, lantschip, from Middle English *landschippe, *landschapp, from Old English landsċipe, landsċeap (“region, district, tract of land”); in some senses from Dutch landschap (“region, district, province, landscape”), from Middle Dutch landscap, lantscap (“region”), from Old Dutch *landskepi, *landskapi (“region”). Cognate with Scots landskape, landskep, landskip (“landscape”), West Frisian lânskip (“landscape”), Low German landschop (“landscape, district”), German Landschaft (“landscape, countryside, scenery”), Danish landskab (“landscape, countryside”), Swedish landskap (“landscape, scenery, province”), Icelandic landskapur (“countryside”). By surface analysis, land + -ship.

Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.