Advertisement

Want to remove ads? Log in to see fewer ads, and become a Premium Member to remove all ads.

Origin and history of millet

millet(n.)

type of cereal grain known from antiquity and cultivated in warm regions, early 15c. (late 14c. as mile), from Old French millet, millot, diminutive of mil "millet," from Latin milium "millet," from PIE root *mele- "to crush, grind." Cognate with Greek meline, Lithuanian malnos (plural) "millet."

also from early 15c.

Entries linking to millet

*mele-

*melə-, Proto-Indo-European root meaning "to crush, grind," with derivatives referring to ground or crumbling substances and crushing or grinding instruments.

It might form all or part of: amyl; amyloid; blintz; emmer; emolument; immolate; maelstrom; mall; malleable; malleolus; mallet; malleus; maul; meal (n.2) "edible ground grain;" mill (n.1) "building fitted to grind grain;" millet; mola; molar (n.); mold (n.3) "loose earth;" molder; ormolu; pall-mall.

It might also be the source of: Hittite mallanzi "they grind;" Armenian malem "I crush, bruise;" Greek mylos "millstone," myle "mill;" Latin molere "to grind," mola "millstone, mill," milium "millet;" Old English melu "meal, flour;" Albanian miel "meal, flour;" Old Church Slavonic meljo, Lithuanian malu, malti "to grind;" Old Church Slavonic mlatu, Russian molotu "hammer."

    Advertisement

    Want to remove ads? Log in to see fewer ads, and become a Premium Member to remove all ads.

    Trends of millet

    adapted from books.google.com/ngrams/ with a 7-year moving average; ngrams are probably unreliable.

    More to explore

    sorghum
    a cane-like grass also known as Indian millet, 1590s, from Modern Latin Sorghum, the genus name, from Italian sorgo "a tall...
    pestle
    Greek ptissein "to winnow," Old Church Slavonic pišo, pichati "to push, thrust, strike," pišenica "wheat," Russian pseno "millet...
    grain
    early 14c., "a small, hard seed," especially of one of the cereal plants, also as a collective singular, "seed of wheat and allied grasses used as food;" also "something resembling grain; a hard particle of other substances" (salt, sand, later gunpowder, etc.), from Old French gr
    cereal
    1832, "grass yielding edible grain and cultivated for food," originally an adjective (1818) "having to do with edible grain," from French céréale (16c., "of Ceres;" 18c. in grain sense), from Latin Cerealis "of grain," originally "of Ceres," from Ceres, Italic goddess of agricult
    mile
    unit of linear measure in Great Britain, the U.S., and a few other countries, formerly used in most European countries before the metric system; Old English mil, from West Germanic *milja (source also of Middle Dutch mile, Dutch mijl, Old High German mila, German Meile), from Lat
    lugubrious
    "expressing or characterized by sadness or mournfulness; doleful," c. 1600, formerly also lugubrous, from -ous + Latin lugubris "mournful, doleful, pertaining to mourning," from lugere "to mourn," from PIE root *leug- "to break; to cause pain" (source also of Greek lygros "mournf
    dearth
    c. 1300, derthe "scarcity of food," of other situations of scarcity by mid-14c., abstract noun from root of Old English deore "precious, costly" (see dear) + abstract noun suffix -th (2). A common Germanic formation, though not always with the same sense (Old Saxon diurtha "splen
    demise
    mid-15c., "transference of property, grant of land for life or a period of years," via Anglo-French from Old French demis, fem. past participle of desmetre "dismiss, put away" (Modern French démettre), from des- "away" (from Latin dis-) + metre "put," from Latin mittere "let go,
    rock
    [stone, mass of mineral matter], Middle English rokke, roche "stone as a substance; large rocky formation, rocky height or outcrop, crag," from Old English rocc (as in stanrocc "stone rock or obelisk") and directly from Old North French roque, variant of Old French roche, which i
    tragedy
    late 14c., "play or other serious literary work with an unhappy ending," from Old French tragedie (14c.), from Latin tragedia "a tragedy," from Greek tragodia "a dramatic poem or play in formal language and having an unhappy resolution," apparently literally "goat song," from tra

    Share millet

    Advertisement

    Want to remove ads? Log in to see fewer ads, and become a Premium Member to remove all ads.

    Trending
    Dictionary entries near millet
    Advertisement

    Want to remove ads? Log in to see fewer ads, and become a Premium Member to remove all ads.

    Want to remove ads? Log in to see fewer ads, and become a Premium Member to remove all ads.