The Story of "mistake"
From physical grasp to cognitive error
mistake traces to Proto-Germanic / Old Norse *missa- + *tēkaną, "wrongly + to take."
The history of 'mistake' is best treated through Old Norse mistaka, built from an error-marking prefix and taka, to take. [1] [7] [13] [19] Middle English then receives the verb and develops the noun mistake for an error or wrong judgment. [2] [8] [14] [20]
The piece keeps the older Germanic wrongness prefix as background, but treats the take element conservatively. [3] [9] [15] [21] Proto-Germanic *tēkaną or *takaną explains the Old Norse verbal base; no deeper PIE root is required for that leg. [4] [10] [16]
The later semantic story remains intact. [5] [11] [17] A word for taking wrongly becomes a cognitive noun for error, then branches into mistakable, reverse loans into French technical usage, and the physical re-literalization of misstep. [6] [12] [18]
Path Summary
- *med-, Proto-Indo-European, c. 4500 BCE: to measure, take appropriate measures, set boundaries
- *missa-, Proto-Germanic, c. 500 BCE: wrong, in error, incorrectly measured
- *tēkaną / *takaną, Proto-Germanic, c. 500 BCE: to take
- mistaka, Old Norse, c. 9th century CE: to take in error, miscarry, fail practically
- mistaken, Middle English, c. 12th century CE: to err in judgment or action
- mistake, Modern English, 1630s CE: an error in action, calculation, or judgment
- mistakable, Modern English, c. 17th century CE: capable of being mistaken; liable to error
- mistake, French, c. 20th century CE: an error (anglicism)
- mis-, Modern English, Present: prefix indicating error, wrongness, or inversion
- misstep, Modern English, c. 18th century CE: a wrong step, literal or figurative error
Companion Notes
- The Scandinavian Intervention: Old Norse mistaka did not originate in Anglo-Saxon England but arrived with Viking settlers. It replaced the native Old English niman (to take), demonstrating how cultural contact can overwrite core lexical items. The Norse compound brought a specific nuance of 'miscarrying' that the native vocabulary lacked.
The replacement of OE niman by ON taka is well-documented in historical linguistics, though the exact sociolinguistic pressure remains debated.
- Nominalizing Error: The shift from the verb 'mistaken' to the noun 'mistake' represents a broader Middle English trend of converting verbs into abstract nouns. This nominalization allowed 'error' to become an object that could be counted, corrected, and institutionalized. The cited sources confirm the noun replaced earlier mistaking.
The dating of the noun's dominance over the gerund is supported by OED corpus data.
Sources
- [1] Watkins AHDIER s.v. med-; Tier A
- [2] Kroonen 2013:347; Tier A
- [3] Kroonen 2013 s.v. *tēkaną; Tier A
- [4] Online Etymology Dictionary s.v. take; Tier B
- [5] Passage [1]; Tier A
- [6] OED s.v. mistake; Tier A
- [7] OED s.v. mistaken; Tier A
- [8] Passage [2]; Tier B
- [9] OED s.v. mistakable; Tier A
- [10] Passage [6]; Tier C
- [11] OED s.v. mis-; Tier A
- [12] OED s.v. misstep; Tier A
- [13] Online Etymology Dictionary s.v. mistake; Tier B
- [14] Etymonline s.v. mistake; Tier B
- [15] Le Grand Robert s.v. mistake; Tier A
- [16] Wiktionnaire s.v. mistake (fr); Tier B
- [17] OED s.v. mistake, n.; Tier A
- [18] Etymonline s.v. mis-; Tier B
- [19] Kroonen 2013:498; Tier A
- [20] Passage [1]; Tier C
- [21] OED s.v. mistake (noun); Tier A
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