Etymograph

English

tenuity

Tenuity comes from Latin tenuitas ‘thinness, fineness, delicateness’, from tenuis ‘thin, slender, slim, lank’, and ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *tenh₂- ‘to stretch’.

  1. Proto-Indo-Europeanc. 4500–2500 BCE*tenh₂-1‘to stretch’reconstructed
  2. Proto-Indo-Europeanc. 4500–2500 BCE*ténh₂us2‘thin’reconstructed
  3. Proto-Italicc. 1500–700 BCE*tən(a)us2reconstructed
  4. Latinc. 75 BCE–200 CEtenuis2‘thin, slender, slim, lank’
  5. Latinc. 75 BCE–200 CEtenuitas3‘thinness, fineness, delicateness’
  6. Englishtodaytenuity3

attested reconstructed ? uncertain or disputed deepest recorded ancestor

  1. 1 Wiktionary, Proto-Indo-European *ténh₂us
  2. 2 Wiktionary, Latin tenuitas
  3. 3 Wiktionary, English tenuity

Lineage

  1. Proto-Indo-Europeanc. 4500–2500 BCE*tenh₂-Wiktionary, Proto-Indo-European *ténh₂us‘to stretch’reconstructed
  2. Proto-Indo-Europeanc. 4500–2500 BCE*ténh₂usWiktionary, Latin tenuitas‘thin’reconstructed
  3. Proto-Italicc. 1500–700 BCE*tən(a)usWiktionary, Latin tenuitasreconstructed
  4. Latinc. 75 BCE–200 CEtenuisWiktionary, Latin tenuitas‘thin, slender, slim, lank’
  5. Latinc. 75 BCE–200 CEtenuitasWiktionary, English tenuity‘thinness, fineness, delicateness’
  6. EnglishtodaytenuityWiktionary, English tenuity

Formed from tenuous + -ity

Linked words

through Proto-Indo-European *ténh₂us ‘thin’

thin, 5 more

through Latin tenuis ‘thin, slender, slim, lank’

extenuating, 5 more

Today it means

noun Thinness, slenderness.

Sources

Sources: Wiktionary, “tenuity”; the older steps come from the Wiktionary entries for Proto-Indo-European *ténh₂us, Latin tenuitas. 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 *tenh₂- / tenuity

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