Etymo

pillow

A soft support for the head when resting.

Played on · Day 22 · word 2 of 5

A Latin word already tucked into Old English

How pillow reached English

oldest first
  1. Latin

    pulvinus

    ‘little cushion, small pillow’

  2. West Germanic

    *pulwi(n)

    reconstructed: not recorded in writing

  3. Old English

    pyle

    ‘cushion, bed-cushion, pillow’

  4. Middle English

    pilwe

  5. English

    pillow

    ‘a head-rest used by a person reclining’

The story of pillow

An everyday English word carries a Latin cushion inside it.

Pillow reaches back through Middle English pilwe and Old English pyle to Latin pulvinus. A familiar everyday object can carry an old borrowing whose spelling has changed enough to conceal the connection.

This selects the forms given in the dictionary; the German relative is not a required intermediate stage.

Source

Merriam-Webster: pillow

Word History supplies the selected route and marks pfuliwi as a related form.

Related

Merriam-Webster also records the related Old High German form pfuliwi.

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