Etymology

shovel

shov·el
S1H4O1V4E1L1

Today it means: A hand tool with a handle, used for moving portions of material such as earth, snow, and grain from one place to another, with some forms also used for digging. In strict usage differentiated from a spade, which is designed solely for small-scale digging and incidental tasks such as chopping of small roots. Full definition →

Middle English schovele ← Old English sċofl ← Proto-Germanic *skuflō
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The story

  1. Proto-Germanic*skublō
  2. Proto-Germanic*skuflō
  3. Old Englishsċofl
  4. Middle Englishschovele
  5. English todayshovel

From Middle English schovele, schovel, showell, shole (> English dialectal shoul, shool), from Old English scofl (“shovel”), from Proto-Germanic *skuflō, *skūflō (“shovel”), equivalent to shove + -el (instrumental/agent suffix). Cognate with Scots shuffle, shule, shuil (“shovel”), Saterland Frisian Sköifel (“shovel”), West Frisian skoffel, schoffel (“hoe, spade, shovel”), Dutch schoffel (“spade, hoe”), Low German Schüfel, Schuffel (“shovel”), German Schaufel (“shovel”), Danish skovl (“shovel”), Faroese skupla (“shovel”), Icelandic skófla (“shovel”), Norwegian skyfle (“shovel”), skyffel (“shovel, hoe”), Swedish skyffel, skovel (“shovel”). Compare typologically Russian пешня (pešnja) (akin to пиха́ть (pixátʹ)), сово́к (sovók) (akin to сова́ть (sovátʹ)).

Words from the same roots

Middle Englishschovele all →

shool

Proto-Germanic*skuflō all →

shool

Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.