Etymology

truant

tru·ant
T1R1U1A1N1T1

Today it means: Shirking or wandering from business or duty; straying; hence, idle; loitering. Full definition →

Middle English truant ← Old French truant ← Gaulish *trugan
Ask AI about its historyChatGPTClaudePerplexityGoogle AIGrok

truant · adjective, noun1

  1. Proto-Indo-European · derived from*terh₁-“to drill, pierce; to rub; to turn”
  2. Proto-Indo-European · derived from*térh₁-tro-m
  3. Proto-Celtic · derived from*taratrom
  4. Breton · derived fromtruan“wretched”
  5. Gaulish · derived from*trugan
  6. Old French · derived fromtruant
  7. Middle English · inherited fromtruant
  8. English todaytruant

The adjective and noun are derived from Middle English truant, truand, truaund (“(adjective) idle; tending to vagrancy (uncertain; may be a use of the noun); (noun) beggar; mendicant friar; vagrant, wanderer; worthless person, rogue, scoundrel; one who is absent without leave, truant; one who shirks duties”), from Old French truant, truand (“(adjective) beggarly; roguish; (noun) a beggar, vagabond; a rogue”) (modern French truand), probably of Celtic origin, possibly from Gaulish *trugan, or from Breton truan (“wretched”), from Proto-Celtic *taratrom, from Proto-Indo-European *térh₁-tro-m, ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *terh₁- (“to drill, pierce; to rub; to turn”). Cognates * Breton truc (“beggar”) * Irish trogán, trogha (“destitute”) * Middle Dutch trawant, trouwant, truwant * Occitan truan * Portuguese truão * Scottish Gaelic trudanach (“vagabond”), truaghan (“wretched”) * Spanish truhan * Welsh tru, truan (“wretched”)

truant · verb2

  1. Middle English · inherited fromtruaunt
  2. Old French · derived fromtruander
  3. Middle English · inherited fromtruaunten“to obtain alms fraudulently; to behave like a rogue or scoundrel; to neglect a duty; to be idle or lazy”
  4. English todaytruant

Inherited from Middle English truaunten (“to obtain alms fraudulently; to behave like a rogue or scoundrel; to neglect a duty; to be idle or lazy”), and then partly: * from Old French truander (modern French truander (“to cheat, to con”)), from truand (noun) (see etymology 1) + -er (suffix forming infinitives of first-conjugation verbs); and * from Middle English truaunt (noun) (see etymology 1) + -en (suffix forming infinitives of verbs).

Words from the same roots

Proto-Indo-European*terh₁- all →

throwthresholdthrashdermathreshthreadbaredreideldetritivoreterebrantterebratulaterebratulid-treme

Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.