Etymograph

English

circle

Circle comes from Old French cercle ‘circle (shape)’, and goes back to Latin circus.

  1. Latinc. 75 BCE–200 CEcircus1‘circle’
  2. Latinc. 75 BCE–200 CEcirculus1diminutive of circus
  3. Old Frenchc. 842–1400cercle1‘circle’
  4. Middle Englishc. 1150–1500circle1
  5. Englishearliest quotation c. 1598–1600circle1

attested reconstructed ? uncertain or disputed deepest recorded ancestor

  1. 1 Wiktionary, English circle
  2. Earliest quotation in Wiktionary’s entry: c. 1598–1600, William Shakespeare, As You Like It: “in the circle of this forest”.

Lineage

  1. Latinc. 75 BCE–200 CEcircusWiktionary, English circle‘circle’
  2. Latinc. 75 BCE–200 CEcirculusWiktionary, English circlediminutive of circus
  3. Old Frenchc. 842–1400cercleWiktionary, English circle‘circle’
  4. Middle Englishc. 1150–1500circleWiktionary, English circle
  5. Englishearliest quotation c. 1598–1600circleWiktionary, English circle. Earliest quotation in Wiktionary’s entry: c. 1598–1600, William Shakespeare, As You Like It: “in the circle of this forest”

Word family

English words that share an ancestor with circle, grouped by the ancestor they share, most familiar first.

through Proto-Indo-European *(s)ker- ‘to cut off, sever’

  • short ← schort ← sċort ← *skurt ← *skurtaz
  • across ← acros ← an croiz ← crois ← crux
  • share ← schar ← sċear ← *skaraz
  • card ← carde ← carda ← *carito ← carō
  • cross ← cros ← kross ← cros ← crux
  • cancer ← *kankros ← *karkros ← *kr-kr-
  • screen ← scren ← escren
  • score ← scoru ← skor ← *skurō
  • shirt ← schirt ← sċyrte ← *skurtijā ← *skurtijǭ
  • curve ← curvus ← *korwos ← *(s)kr̥wós
  • scare ← scaren ← skirra ← *skirzijaną
  • crucial

164 more relatives in the full family tree

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Today it means

noun A two-dimensional geometric figure, a line, consisting of the set of all those points in a plane that are equally distant from a given point (center).

Sources

Sources: Wiktionary, “circle”. 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 circus / circle