Etymology

trait

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Today it means: An identifying characteristic, habit or trend. Full definition →

Middle French trait ← Latin tractus
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The story

  1. Latin · derived fromtrahō
  2. Latin · derived fromtractus“drawing, pulling”
  3. Middle French · borrowed fromtrait“line, feature”
  4. English todaytrait

Borrowed from Middle French trait (“line, feature”), from Latin tractus (“drawing, pulling”), from Latin trahō. Doublet of tract.

Words from the same roots

Latintractus all →

tracttractortractiontractustractile

Latintrahō all →

train

Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.