English
tourniquet
Tourniquet comes from French tourniquet ‘revolving door or turnstile’, from tourner ‘to turn’, and ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *terh₁-.
- Proto-Indo-Europeanc. 4500–2500 BCE*terh₁-1‘to rub, turn’reconstructed
- Proto-Indo-Europeanc. 4500–2500 BCE*tórh₁nos1reconstructed
- Proto-Hellenicc. 2200–1600 BCE*tórnos1reconstructed
- Ancient Greekc. 800–300 BCEτόρνος1tórnos‘a lathe’
- Latinc. 75 BCE–200 CEtornus1‘lathe’
- Latinc. 75 BCE–200 CEtornō2as tornāre‘turn’
- Old Frenchc. 842–1400torner2‘to turn’
- Middle Frenchc. 1400–1600tourner2‘to turn (to rotate)’
- Frenchc. 1600–presenttourner3‘to turn’
- Frenchc. 1600–presenttourniquet3‘revolving door or turnstile’
- Englishearliest quotation 1907tourniquet3
attested reconstructed ? uncertain or disputed deepest recorded ancestor
- 1 Wiktionary, Latin torno
- 2 Wiktionary, French tourner
- 3 Wiktionary, English tourniquet
- Earliest quotation in Wiktionary’s entry: 1907, Robert William Chambers, New York: “His forefathers had been, as a rule, professional men—physicians…”.
Lineage
- Proto-Indo-Europeanc. 4500–2500 BCE*terh₁-Wiktionary, Latin torno‘to rub, turn’reconstructed
- Proto-Indo-Europeanc. 4500–2500 BCE*tórh₁nosWiktionary, Latin tornoreconstructed
- Proto-Hellenicc. 2200–1600 BCE*tórnosWiktionary, Latin tornoreconstructed
- Ancient Greekc. 800–300 BCEτόρνοςWiktionary, Latin tornotórnos‘a lathe’
- Latinc. 75 BCE–200 CEtornusWiktionary, Latin torno‘lathe’
- Latinc. 75 BCE–200 CEtornōWiktionary, French tourneras tornāre‘turn’
- Old Frenchc. 842–1400tornerWiktionary, French tourner‘to turn’
- Middle Frenchc. 1400–1600tournerWiktionary, French tourner‘to turn (to rotate)’
- Frenchc. 1600–presenttournerWiktionary, English tourniquet‘to turn’
- Frenchc. 1600–presenttourniquetWiktionary, English tourniquet‘revolving door or turnstile’
- Englishearliest quotation 1907tourniquetWiktionary, English tourniquet. Earliest quotation in Wiktionary’s entry: 1907, Robert William Chambers, New York: “His forefathers had been, as a rule, professional men—physicians…”
Linked words
through Proto-Indo-European *terh₁- ‘to rub, turn’
throw, thread, tragic, threshold, trout, detrimental, tyrone, attrition, thrash, detriment, overturn, triage, trite, termite, tribulation, detritus, truant, thresher, tyro, thresh, upturn, derma, 37 more
through Latin tornō ‘turn’
return, tournament, turner, 7 more
through Old French torner ‘to turn’
through French tourner ‘to turn’
Today it means
noun A tightly-compressed bandage used to stop bleeding by stopping the flow of blood through a large artery in a limb.
Sources
Sources: Wiktionary, “tourniquet”; the older steps come from the Wiktionary entries for Latin torno, French tourner. 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 *terh₁- / tourniquet