Etymology

surreal

sur·re·al
S1U1R1R1E1A1L1

Today it means: Resembling a dream: fantastic and incongruous. Full definition →

English surrealismbf. ← French surréalisme ← Middle French real
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The story

  1. Proto-Indo-European*úp
  2. Proto-Indo-European*upér
  3. Proto-Italic*super
  4. Latinsuper
  5. Latinsuper-
  6. Old Frenchsur-
  7. Frenchsur-
  8. Proto-Indo-European*(H)reh₁-
  9. Proto-Indo-European*(H)reh₁ís
  10. Proto-Italic*reis
  11. Classical Latinrēs
  12. Proto-Indo-European*h₂el-
  13. Proto-Indo-European*h₂élisder.?
  14. Late Latinreālis
  15. Old Frenchreel
  16. Middle Frenchreal
  17. Frenchréel
  18. Frenchréalisme
  19. Frenchsurréalisme
  20. Englishsurrealismbf.
  21. English todaysurreal

A back-formation from surrealism, equivalent to sur- + real.

Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.