Etymograph

English

concept

Concept comes from Latin conceptus ‘a thought, purpose, also a conceiving, etc’, and goes back to concipiō.

  1. Latinc. 75 BCE–200 CEconcipiō1‘to take in’
  2. Latinc. 75 BCE–200 CEconceptus1‘a thought’
  3. Middle Frenchc. 1400–1600concept1
  4. Englishearliest quotation 1855concept1

attested reconstructed ? uncertain or disputed deepest recorded ancestor

  1. 1 Wiktionary, English concept
  2. Earliest quotation in Wiktionary’s entry: 1855, Thomas Reid, Essay IV. Of Conception: “The words conception, concept, notion, should be limited to…”.

Lineage

  1. Latinc. 75 BCE–200 CEconcipiōWiktionary, English concept‘to take in’
  2. Latinc. 75 BCE–200 CEconceptusWiktionary, English concept‘a thought’
  3. Middle Frenchc. 1400–1600conceptWiktionary, English concept
  4. Englishearliest quotation 1855conceptWiktionary, English concept. Earliest quotation in Wiktionary’s entry: 1855, Thomas Reid, Essay IV. Of Conception: “The words conception, concept, notion, should be limited to…”

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Today it means

noun An abstract and general idea; an abstraction.

Sources

Sources: Wiktionary, “concept”. 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 concipiō / concept