Etymograph

English

camp

Camp comes from Middle English kampe ‘battlefield, open space’, and goes back to Latin campus.

  1. Latinc. 75 BCE–200 CEcampus1‘open field’
  2. Proto-West Germanicc. 200–500 CE*kamp1‘open field where military exercises are held’reconstructed
  3. Old Englishc. 450–1150camp1‘battle’
  4. Middle Englishc. 1150–1500kampe1‘battlefield’
  5. Englishearliest quotation c. 1587–1588camp1

attested reconstructed ? uncertain or disputed deepest recorded ancestor

  1. 1 Wiktionary, English camp
  2. Earliest quotation in Wiktionary’s entry: c. 1587–1588, Christopher Marlowe, Tamburlaine the Great. […] The First Part […]: “My Campe is like to Iulius Cæſars Hoſte, That…”.

Lineage

  1. Latinc. 75 BCE–200 CEcampusWiktionary, English camp‘open field’
  2. Proto-West Germanicc. 200–500 CE*kampWiktionary, English camp‘open field where military exercises are held’reconstructed
  3. Old Englishc. 450–1150campWiktionary, English camp‘battle’
  4. Middle Englishc. 1150–1500kampeWiktionary, English camp‘battlefield’
  5. Englishearliest quotation c. 1587–1588campWiktionary, English camp. Earliest quotation in Wiktionary’s entry: c. 1587–1588, Christopher Marlowe, Tamburlaine the Great. […] The First Part […]: “My Campe is like to Iulius Cæſars Hoſte, That…”

The story

Reinforced circa 1520 by Middle French can, camp (‘place where an army lodges temporarily’), from Old Northern French camp, from the same Latin (whence also French champ from Old French).

Full etymology on Wiktionary

Linked words

through Proto-Indo-European *kh₂emp- ‘to bend’

gam, jamb, gamba, 18 more

through Latin campus ‘open field, level plain’

champagne, champaign, 12 more

through Proto-West Germanic *kamp ‘open field where military exercises are held,…’

champion, champ, kemp, 1 more

Another origin of camp

  1. Frenchc. 1600–presentcamper‘to put oneself in a pose’disputed
  2. Englishtodaycamp

Suggested origins include the 17th century French word camper (‘to put oneself in a pose’), an assumed dialectal English word *camp or *kemp (‘rough, uncouth’) and a derivation from camp (n.) Believed to be from Polari, but otherwise obscure.disputed Scholars disagree here; the competing view is quoted as the source gives it.

Another origin of camp

  1. Proto-Indo-Europeanc. 4500–2500 BCE*kh₂ém-po-suncertain
  2. Proto-Italicc. 1500–700 BCE*kamposuncertain
  3. Latinc. 75 BCE–200 CEcampus‘wild field’
  4. Old Spanishc. 950–1500campo‘field, open plain’
  5. Spanishc. 1500–presentcampo‘countryside’
  6. Englishtodaycamp

Today it means

noun An outdoor place acting as temporary accommodation in tents or other simple structures.

Sources

Sources: Wiktionary, “camp”. By Wiktionary contributors, CC BY-SA 4.0, via kaikki.org (dump of Oct 3 2026); text adapted and restructured. Language periods are conventional ranges, not dates for this word. License.

Etymograph / Latin campus / camp

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