Etymograph

English

picture

Picture comes from Middle English picture, from Latin pictūra ‘the art of painting’, from pingō ‘to paint’, ultimately from PIE *peyḱ-.

  1. Proto-Indo-Europeanc. 4500–2500 BCE*peyḱ-1‘to mark’reconstructed
  2. Proto-Indo-Europeanc. 4500–2500 BCE*pinéḱti1reconstructed
  3. Proto-Italicc. 1500–700 BCE*pingō1reconstructed
  4. Latinc. 75 BCE–200 CEpingō2‘to paint’
  5. Latinc. 75 BCE–200 CEpictūra2‘the art of painting’
  6. Middle Englishc. 1150–1500picture2‘the act or discipline of drawing or painting’
  7. Englishearliest quotation 1655picture2

attested reconstructed ? uncertain or disputed deepest recorded ancestor

  1. 1 Wiktionary, Latin pingo, which cites Pokorny
  2. 2 Wiktionary, English picture
  3. Earliest quotation in Wiktionary’s entry: 1655, James Howell, To my Brother Dr. Howell: “the young king's picture[…]in virgin wax”.

Lineage

  1. Proto-Indo-Europeanc. 4500–2500 BCE*peyḱ-Wiktionary, Latin pingo, which cites Pokorny‘to mark’reconstructed
  2. Proto-Indo-Europeanc. 4500–2500 BCE*pinéḱtiWiktionary, Latin pingo, which cites Pokornyreconstructed
  3. Proto-Italicc. 1500–700 BCE*pingōWiktionary, Latin pingo, which cites Pokornyreconstructed
  4. Latinc. 75 BCE–200 CEpingōWiktionary, English picture‘to paint’
  5. Latinc. 75 BCE–200 CEpictūraWiktionary, English picture‘the art of painting’
  6. Middle Englishc. 1150–1500pictureWiktionary, English picture‘the act or discipline of drawing or painting’
  7. Englishearliest quotation 1655pictureWiktionary, English picture. Earliest quotation in Wiktionary’s entry: 1655, James Howell, To my Brother Dr. Howell: “the young king's picture[…]in virgin wax”

Linked words

through Proto-Indo-European *peyḱ- ‘to mark, paint’

fish, file, feud, piscina, 25 more

through Proto-Italic *pingō

pinto, 7 more

through Latin pingō ‘to paint’

paint, pint, pigment, depiction, depict, pictorial, pimento, 8 more

Today it means

noun A representation of anything (as a person, a landscape, a building) upon canvas, paper, or other surface, by drawing, painting, printing, photography, etc.

Sources

Sources: Wiktionary, “picture”; the older steps come from the Wiktionary entry for Latin pingo. 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 *peyḱ- / picture

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