petroleum

puh-TROH-lee-uhm · noun

Origin

English borrowed "petroleum" directly from Medieval Latin petroleum, as a learned borrowing rather than through everyday speech.

This is Curio: one word's origin story, every morning. No feed, no backlog.

One short email each morning. Free; stop anytime. See a sample →

The word seems to have carried its sense over intact from Medieval Latin into English usage.

"Petroleum" is a doublet of "petrol" — the two words trace back to the same source but took separate paths into English.

From Latin

Nearby, A–Z