Where does “sightseeing” come from?
Sightseeing is a compound of English sight and seeing, ultimately deriving from Old English sihþ and the suffix -ing, with roots tracing through Latin sedes to Proto-Indo-European sed-, meaning to sit or settle.
sightseeing (English): The activity of going out looking at things;...
Definitions
- The activity of going out looking at things;...
Ancestry of “sightseeing”, step by step
sightseeing traces back through two separate lines of ancestry.
via English seeing
| Step | Language | Word | Meaning |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | English | seeing | present participle of see; Having vision; not... |
| 2 | English | -ing | Used to form gerunds, a type of verbal nouns,... |
| 3 | Old English | -ing | Forming nouns from verbs, indicating action,... |
| 4 | Old English | -tūn | homestead, village, town |
| 5 | Old English | tūn | enclosure, yard; place; dwelling |
| 6 | Proto-West Germanic | tūn | fence |
| 7 | Proto-Germanic | tūną | fence; enclosure |
| 8 | Gaulish | dunum | fort; hill, hillfort |
| 9 | Proto-Celtic | dūnom | stronghold, rampart |
| 10 | Proto-Indo-European | dʰewh₂- | smoke; mist, haze |