Where does “accidental” come from?
Accidental comes from Anglo-Norman accidentel, meaning something not essential or arising by chance rather than by design.
accidental (English): Not essential; incidental, secondary;...
Definitions
- Not essential; incidental, secondary;...
Ancestry of “accidental”, step by step
| Step | Language | Word | Meaning |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Middle English | accidental | — |
| 2 | Middle French | accidentel | — |
| 3 | Late Latin | accidentalis | — |
| 4 | Latin | accidēns | falling down, upon, at or near, descending |
| 5 | Latin | accidō | to fall down, upon, at or near; descend |
| 6 | Latin | ad- | to; usually prefixed to verbs, in which cases it... |
| 7 | Latin | īn- | un-, non-, not |
| 8 | Latin | în | in, at, on, upon, from (space) |
| 9 | Latin | en | lookǃ beholdǃ; reallyǃ?; come onǃ |
| 10 | Proto-Italic | en | in |
| 11 | Proto-Indo-European | h₁én | in |