English
tubercle
Tubercle comes from Latin tūberculum ‘a small swelling, bump, or protuberance’, and goes back to tūber.
- Latinc. 75 BCE–200 CEtūber1‘hump, bump, swelling, protuberance’
- Latinc. 75 BCE–200 CEtūberculum2‘a small swelling, bump, or protuberance’
- Englishearliest quotation 1869tubercle2
attested reconstructed ? uncertain or disputed deepest recorded ancestor
- 1 Wiktionary, Latin tuberculum
- 2 Wiktionary, English tubercle
- Earliest quotation in Wiktionary’s entry: 1869, Alfred Russel Wallace, The Malay Archipelago: “The four long white plumes which give the bird…”.
Earlier history uncertain. See Wiktionary.
Lineage
- Latinc. 75 BCE–200 CEtūberWiktionary, Latin tuberculum‘hump, bump, swelling, protuberance’
- Latinc. 75 BCE–200 CEtūberculumWiktionary, English tubercle‘a small swelling, bump, or protuberance’
- Englishearliest quotation 1869tubercleWiktionary, English tubercle. Earliest quotation in Wiktionary’s entry: 1869, Alfred Russel Wallace, The Malay Archipelago: “The four long white plumes which give the bird…”
Linked words
through Proto-Indo-European *tewh₂- ‘to swell’
butter, tomb, tumor, soma, tumour, tumultuous, tyrosine, trifle, tumult, madrasa, turgid, 43 more
through Proto-Italic *tūβos
through Latin tūber ‘hump, bump, swelling, protuberance’
Today it means
noun A round nodule, small eminence, or warty outgrowth, especially those found on bones for the attachment of a muscle or ligament or small elevations on the surface of a tooth.
Sources
Sources: Wiktionary, “tubercle”; the older steps come from the Wiktionary entry for Latin tuberculum. 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 tūber / tubercle