Etymograph

English

file

File comes from Old French fil ‘thread’, from Latin fīlum ‘thread’, ultimately from PIE *gʷʰiH-(s-)lo-.

  1. Proto-Indo-Europeanc. 4500–2500 BCE*gʷʰiH-(s-)lo-1‘sinew’reconstructed
  2. Proto-Italicc. 1500–700 BCE*fī(s)lom1reconstructed
  3. Latinc. 75 BCE–200 CEfīlum2‘thread’
  4. Old Frenchc. 842–1400fil2‘thread’
  5. Englishearliest quotation c. 1604–1605file2

attested reconstructed ? uncertain or disputed deepest recorded ancestor

  1. 1 Wiktionary, Latin filum
  2. 2 Wiktionary, English file
  3. Earliest quotation in Wiktionary’s entry: c. 1604–1605, William Shakespeare, All’s Well, that Ends Well: “It is upon a file with the duke's other…”.

Lineage

  1. Proto-Indo-Europeanc. 4500–2500 BCE*gʷʰiH-(s-)lo-Wiktionary, Latin filum‘sinew’reconstructed
  2. Proto-Italicc. 1500–700 BCE*fī(s)lomWiktionary, Latin filumreconstructed
  3. Latinc. 75 BCE–200 CEfīlumWiktionary, English file‘thread’
  4. Old Frenchc. 842–1400filWiktionary, English file‘thread’
  5. Englishearliest quotation c. 1604–1605fileWiktionary, English file. Earliest quotation in Wiktionary’s entry: c. 1604–1605, William Shakespeare, All’s Well, that Ends Well: “It is upon a file with the duke's other…”

Word family

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

through Proto-Italic *fī(s)lom

  • filamentous ← filament ← fīlāmentum ← fīlō ← fīlum

through Latin fīlum ‘thread’

  • annihilation ← annihilātiō ← annihilō ← nihil ← hīlum
  • annihilate ← annihilātus ← annihilō ← nihil ← hīlum
  • filament ← fīlāmentum ← fīlō
  • nihilism ← nihilisme ← Nihilismus ← nihil ← nihilum
  • nihilist ← nihil ← hīlum
  • nihil ← hīlum

through Old French fil ‘thread’

87 more relatives in the full family tree

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Another origin of file

  1. Proto-Indo-Europeanc. 4500–2500 BCE*gʷʰiH-(s-)lo-‘sinew’reconstructed
  2. Proto-Italicc. 1500–700 BCE*fī(s)lomreconstructed
  3. Latinc. 75 BCE–200 CEfilum‘thread’
  4. Latinc. 75 BCE–200 CEfīlāre
  5. Frenchc. 1600–presentfiler‘to spin out, arrange one behind another’
  6. Frenchc. 1600–presentfile
  7. Englishtodayfile

Another origin of file

  1. Proto-Indo-Europeanc. 4500–2500 BCE*peyḱ-‘to adorn, form’reconstructed
  2. Proto-Germanicc. 500 BCE–200 CE*finhlō‘rasp, file’reconstructed
  3. Old Englishc. 450–1150fēl
  4. Middle Englishc. 1150–1500file
  5. Englishtodayfile

Another origin of file

  1. Proto-Indo-Europeanc. 4500–2500 BCE*puH-‘to be rotten’reconstructed
  2. Proto-Indo-Europeanc. 4500–2500 BCE*púH-lo-sreconstructed
  3. Proto-Germanicc. 500 BCE–200 CE*fūlaz‘dirty’reconstructed
  4. Proto-Germanicc. 500 BCE–200 CE*fūlijaną‘to befoul, make dirty’reconstructed
  5. Proto-West Germanicc. 200–500 CE*fūlijan‘to make foul’reconstructed
  6. Old Englishc. 450–1150fȳlan‘to defile, make foul’
  7. Middle Englishc. 1150–1500filen‘to defile’
  8. Englishtodayfile

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Today it means

noun A collection of papers collated and archived together.

Sources

Sources: Wiktionary, “file”; the older steps come from the Wiktionary entry for Latin filum. 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-Indo-European *gʷʰiH-(s-)lo- / file