pumpkin

Pumpkin is an alteration of the earlier English pompion or pumpion, formed by adding the diminutive suffix -kin. That earlier word came from Middle French pompon, tracing back through Latin pepō to Ancient Greek pépōn, meaning 'large melon,' itself from pépōn, 'ripe,' and ultimately the verb péptō, 'to ripen.'

The word first appears in English in 1647, already shaped by the addition of -kin to pompion. A popular theory tracing it instead to Massachusett pôhpukun, 'grows forth round,' is not accurate. In modern slang, the automotive sense of 'pumpkin' comes from a fancied resemblance to the vegetable's shape.

Pumpkin shares its Latin root pepō with the English word pepo, the botanical term for the type of fruit that includes melons, squashes, and pumpkins themselves.