Etymograph

English

human

Human comes from Middle French humain ‘human’, and goes back to Latin hūmānus.

  1. Latinc. 75 BCE–200 CEhūmānus1‘of man’
  2. Old Frenchc. 842–1400humain1
  3. Middle Frenchc. 1400–1600humain1‘human’
  4. Middle Englishc. 1150–1500humaigne1
  5. Englishearliest quotation c. 1587–1588human1

attested reconstructed ? uncertain or disputed deepest recorded ancestor

  1. 1 Wiktionary, English human
  2. Earliest quotation in Wiktionary’s entry: c. 1587–1588, Christopher Marlowe, Tamburlaine the Great. […] The First Part […]: “Some powers diuine, or els infernall, mixt / Their…”.

Lineage

  1. Latinc. 75 BCE–200 CEhūmānusWiktionary, English human‘of man’
  2. Old Frenchc. 842–1400humainWiktionary, English human
  3. Middle Frenchc. 1400–1600humainWiktionary, English human‘human’
  4. Middle Englishc. 1150–1500humaigneWiktionary, English human
  5. Englishearliest quotation c. 1587–1588humanWiktionary, English human. Earliest quotation in Wiktionary’s entry: c. 1587–1588, Christopher Marlowe, Tamburlaine the Great. […] The First Part […]: “Some powers diuine, or els infernall, mixt / Their…”

The story

Spelling human has been predominant since the early 18th century.

Full etymology on Wiktionary

Word family

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

through Proto-Indo-European *ǵʰmṓ

  • goon ← gone ← guma ← *gumō ← *gumô

through Latin hemō

through Latin homō

through Latin hūmānus ‘of man, human’

44 more relatives in the full family tree

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Today it means

adj Of or belonging to the species Homo sapiens or its closest relatives.

Sources

Sources: Wiktionary, “human”. 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 hūmānus / human