Etymograph

English

delight

Delight comes from Latin dēlectāre ‘to delight, please’, from dēlicere ‘to allure, entice’, and ultimately from Proto-Italic *lakjō ‘to draw, pull’.

  1. Proto-Italicc. 1500–700 BCE*lakjō1‘to draw, pull’reconstructed
  2. Latinc. 75 BCE–200 CElaciō1‘to lure, to deceive’
  3. Latinc. 75 BCE–200 CEdēlicere1‘to allure, entice’
  4. Latinc. 75 BCE–200 CEdēlectāre1‘to delight, please’frequentative of dēlicere
  5. Old Frenchc. 842–1400deleiter1
  6. Middle Englishc. 1150–1500delite1
  7. Englishearliest quotation c. 1515–1516delight1

attested reconstructed ? uncertain or disputed deepest recorded ancestor

  1. 1 Wiktionary, English delight
  2. Earliest quotation in Wiktionary’s entry: c. 1515–1516, published 1568, John Skelton: “A ſclaunderous tunge, a tunge of a ſkolde, Worketh…”.

Lineage

  1. Proto-Italicc. 1500–700 BCE*lakjōWiktionary, English delight‘to draw, pull’reconstructed
  2. Latinc. 75 BCE–200 CElaciōWiktionary, English delight‘to lure, to deceive’
  3. Latinc. 75 BCE–200 CEdēlicereWiktionary, English delight‘to allure, entice’
  4. Latinc. 75 BCE–200 CEdēlectāreWiktionary, English delight‘to delight, please’frequentative of dēlicere
  5. Old Frenchc. 842–1400deleiterWiktionary, English delight
  6. Middle Englishc. 1150–1500deliteWiktionary, English delight
  7. Englishearliest quotation c. 1515–1516delightWiktionary, English delight. Earliest quotation in Wiktionary’s entry: c. 1515–1516, published 1568, John Skelton: “A ſclaunderous tunge, a tunge of a ſkolde, Worketh…”

The story

Attested from the 13th century, from Middle English delite, from Old French deleiter, deliter, from Latin dēlectāre (‘to delight, please’), frequentative of dēlicere (‘to allure, entice’), from dē- (‘away’) + laciō (‘to lure, to deceive’), from Proto-Italic *lakjō (‘to draw, pull’), of unknown ultimate origin.uncertain The source flags this step as uncertain. Related with delectation, delicate, delicious and dilettante. The modern unetymological spelling (instead of expected delite) is influenced by light and other words ending in -ight, such as might, bright, etc. The -gh- may also be an attempt to represent the Latin -c-; compare obsolete indight for indict.

Full etymology on Wiktionary

Linked words

through Latin laciō ‘to lure, to deceive’

delicate, elicit, 8 more

through Latin dēlicere ‘to allure, entice’

delicious

Today it means

noun Joy; pleasure.

Sources

Sources: Wiktionary, “delight”. 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 / Proto-Italic *lakjō / delight

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