Etymology

microtone

M3I1C3R1O1T1O1N1E1

Today it means: Any interval smaller than a semitone Full definition →

English tone ← Middle English tone ← Latin tonus
Ask AI about its historyChatGPTClaudePerplexityGoogle AIGrok

The story

  1. Englishmicro-
  2. Proto-Indo-European*ten-
  3. Proto-Indo-European*tónos
  4. Proto-Hellenic*tónos
  5. Ancient Greekτόνος (tónos)
  6. Latintonus
  7. Middle Englishtone
  8. Englishtone
  9. English todaymicrotone

From micro- + tone.

Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.