Where does “tenderfoot” come from?
Tenderfoot comes from English tender and English foot, with tender deriving from Latin tendere meaning to stretch or extend, and foot from Chinese 兒.
tenderfoot (English): An inexperienced person; a novice; A newcomer or...
Definitions
- An inexperienced person; a novice; A newcomer or...
Ancestry of “tenderfoot”, step by step
| Step | Language | Word | Meaning |
|---|
| 1 | English | tender | Sensitive or painful to the touch; Easily bruised... |
| 2 | English | tend | To make a tender of; to offer or tender; To be... |
| 3 | Middle English | tenden | — |
| 4 | Middle English | attenden | to attend |
| 5 | Old French | atendre | to wait |
| 6 | Latin | attendō | — |
| 7 | Latin | ad- | to; usually prefixed to verbs, in which cases it... |
| 8 | Latin | īn- | — |
| 9 | Latin | în | — |
| 10 | Latin | en | lookǃ beholdǃ; reallyǃ?; come onǃ |
| 11 | Proto-Italic | en | in |
| 12 | Proto-Indo-European | h₁én | in |