Online Etymology Dictionary

somnambulant: 1843 (n.); 1866 (adj.), from Latin somnus "sleep" (see somnolence) + ambulantem (nominative ambulans), present participle of ambulare (see amble).
somnambulate (v.): 1833, from Latin somnus "sleep" (see somnolence) + ambulare "to walk" (see amble).
somnambulator (n.): 1822, agent noun in Latin form from somnambulate.
somnambulism (n.): 1794 (as somnambulation), from Modern Latin somnambulus "sleepwalker," from Latin somnus "sleep" (see somnolence) + ambulare "to walk" (see amble). Won out over noctambulation.
somniferous (adj.): c.1600, from Latin somnifer, from somni-, comb. form of somnus "sleep" (see somnolence) + ferre "to bear" (see infer) + -ous.
somniloquy (n.): talking in one's sleep, 1847, from somni-, comb. form of somnus "sleep" (see somnolence) + loqui "to speak" (see locution). Related: Somniloquence; somniloquent (1804); somniloquist; somniloquous; somniloquize.
somnolence (n.): late 14c., from Old French sompnolence, from Latin somnolentia "sleepiness," from somnolentus, from somnus "sleep," from PIE *swep-no, from root *swep- "sleep" (cf. Sanskrit svapnah, Avestan kvafna-, Greek hypnos, Lithuanian sapnas, Old Church Slavonic sunu, Old Irish suan, Welsh hun "sleep," Latin sopor "a deep sleep," Old English swefn, Old Norse svefn "a dream").
somnolent (adj.): late 15c., sompnolent, from Old French sompnolent (Modern French somnolent) or directly from Latin somnolentus, from somnus "sleep" (see somnolence). Respelled 17c. on Latin model.
son (n.): Old English sunu "son," from Proto-Germanic *sunuz (cf. Old Saxon and Old Frisian sunu, Old Norse sonr, Danish søn, Swedish son, Middle Dutch sone, Dutch zoon, Old High German sunu, German Sohn, Gothic sunus "son").

The Germanic words are from PIE *sunu-/*sunyu- (cf. Sanskrit sunus, Greek huios, Avestan hunush, Armenian ustr, Lithuanian sunus, Old Church Slavonic synu, Russian and Polish syn "son"), from root *su- "to give birth" (cf. Sanskrit sauti "gives birth," Old Irish suth "birth, offspring"). Son of _____ as the title of a sequel to a book or movie is recorded from 1929.
son of a bitch: 1707 as a direct phrase, but implied much earlier, and Old Norse had bikkju-sonr.
Abide þou þef malicious!
Biche-sone þou drawest amis
þou schalt abigge it ywis!
["Of Arthour & of Merlin," c.1330]
"Probably the most common American vulgarity from about the middle of the eighteenth century to the middle of the twentieth" [Rawson].
Our maid-of-all-work in that department [indecency] is son-of-a-bitch, which seems as pale and ineffectual to a Slav or a Latin as fudge does to us. There is simply no lift in it, no shock, no sis-boom-ah. The dumbest policeman in Palermo thinks of a dozen better ones between breakfast and the noon whistle. [H.L. Mencken, "The American Language," 4th ed., 1936, p.317-8]
Abbreviated form SOB from 1918. Mencken, complaining of the tepidity of the American vocabulary of profanity, writes that the toned-down form son-of-a-gun "is so lacking in punch that the Italians among us have borrowed it as a satirical name for an American: la sanemagogna is what they call him, and by it they indicate their contempt for his backwardness in the art that is one of their great glories."
It was in 1934 also that the New York Daily News, with commendable frankness, in reporting a hearing in Washington at which Senator Huey P. Long featured, forsook the old-time dashes and abbreviations and printed the complete epithet "son of a bitch." [Stanley Walker, "City Editor," 1934]
sonant: 1846, from Latin sonantem (nominative sonans), present participle of sonare "make a noise," related to sonus "sound" (see sound (n.1)).
sonar (n.): 1946, from first letters of "sound navigation ranging," on pattern of radar.
sonata (n.): 1690s, from Italian sonata "piece of instrumental music," literally "sounded" (i.e. "played on an instrument," as opposed to cantata "sung"), fem. past participle of sonare "to sound," from Latin sonare "to sound" (see sound (n.1)). Meaning narrowed by mid-18c. toward application to large-scale works in three or four movements.
sone (n.): unit of loudness, 1936, from Latin sonus (see sound (n.1)).
song (n.): Old English sang "art of singing, a metrical composition adapted for singing," from Proto-Germanic *sangwaz (cf. Old Norse söngr, Norwegian song, Swedish sång, Old Saxon, Danish, Old Frisian, Old High German, German sang, Middle Dutch sanc, Dutch zang, Gothic saggws), related to sing (q.v.).

Phrase for a song is from "All's Well" III.ii.9. With a song in (one's) heart "feeling of joy" is first attested 1930 in Lorenz Hart's lyric. Song and dance as a form of vaudeville act is attested from 1872; figurative sense of "rigmarole" is from 1895.
song-bird (n.): 1774, from song (n.) + bird (n.1).
songbook (n.): Old English sangboc; see song (n.) + book (n.).
songster (n.): Old English sangystre; see song (n.) + -ster.
sonic (adj.): 1923, from Latin sonus "sound" (see sound (n.1)). Sonic boom is attested from 1952.
sonnet (n.): 1557 (in title of Surrey's poems), from French sonnet (1540s) or directly from Italian sonetto, literally "little song," from Old Provençal sonet "song," diminutive of son "song, sound," from Latin sonus "sound" (see sound (n.1)).

Originally in English also "any short lyric poem;" precise meaning is from Italian, where Petrarch (14c.) developed a scheme of an eight-line stanza (rhymed abba abba) followed by a six-line stanza (cdecde, the Italian sestet, or cdcdcd, the Sicilian sestet). Shakespeare developed the English Sonnet for his rhyme-poor native tongue: three Sicilian quatrains followed by a heroic couplet (ababcdcdefefgg). The first stanza sets a situation or problem, and the second comments on it or resolves it.
sonny (n.): "small boy," 1850, from son + -y (3). As a familiar form of address to one younger or inferior, from 1870.
sonogram (n.): 1956, from comb. form of Latin sonus (see sound (n.1)) + -gram.
sonority (n.): 1620s, from French sonorité or directly from Latin sonoritas, from sonorus (see sonorous).
sonorous (adj.): 1610s, from Latin sonorus "resounding," from sonor (genitive sonoris) "sound, noise," from sonare "to sound" (see sound (n.1)).
sook: variant of souk.
soon (adv.): Old English sona "at once, immediately," from West Germanic *sæno (cf. Old Frisian son, Old Saxon sana, Old High German san, Gothic suns "soon"). Sense shifted early Middle English to "within a short time" through human nature (cf. anon). American English. Sooner for "Oklahoma native" is 1930, from the fact that in 1889 many settlers of the territory sneaked onto public land and staked their claims "sooner" than the legal date and time.
soot (n.): Old English sot, from Proto-Germanic *sotam "soot" (cf. Old Norse sot, Old Dutch soet, North Frisian sutt), literally "what settles," from PIE *sodo- (cf. Old Church Slavonic sazda, Lithuanian suodziai, Old Irish suide, Breton huzel "soot"), from root *sod-/*sed- "to sit" (see sedentary).
sooth (n.): Old English soð "truth," noun use of soþ (adj.) "true," originally *sonþ-, from Proto-Germanic *santhaz (cf. Old Norse sannr, Old Saxon soth, Old High German sand "true," Gothic sunja "truth"), and thus cognate with Old English synn "sin" and Latin sontis "guilty" (truth is related to guilt via "being the one;" see sin), from PIE *es-ont- "being, existence," thus "real, true," from present participle of root *es-, the s-form of the verb "to be" (see be), preserved in Latin sunt "they are" and German sind. Archaic in English, it is the root of modern words for "true" in Swedish (sann) and Danish (sand). In common use until c.1650, then obsolete until revived as an archaism early 19c. by Scott, etc.
soothe (v.): Old English soðian "show to be true," from soð "true" (see sooth). Sense of "quiet, comfort, mollify" is first recorded 1690s, on notion of "to assuage one by asserting that what he says is true" (i.e. to be a yes-man), a sense attested from 1560s.
soothing (adj.): 1590s, "flattering," from present participle of soothe. Sense of "mollifying" is from 1746. Related: Soothingly.
soothsayer (n.): mid-14c., "one who speaks truth;" late 14c., "fortune-teller;" see sooth + say. Old English had soðsagu "act of speaking the truth," seðan "declare (the truth)."
sooty (adj.): mid-13c., from soot + -y (2). Related: Sootiness.
sop (n.): Old English sopp- "bread soaked in some liquid," (in soppcuppe "cup into which sops are put"), from Proto-Germanic *suppo, related to Old English verb suppan (see sup (2)), probably reinforced by Old French soupe (see soup (n.)). Meaning "something given to appease" is from 1660s, a reference to the sop given by the Sibyl to Cerberus in the "Aeneid."
sopaipilla (n.): also sopapilla, by 1983, from Mexican Spanish, ultimately from Old Spanish sopa "food soaked in liquid," from a Germanic source, from PIE *seue- "to take liquid" (see sup (2)).
soph (n.): shortened form of sophomore, 1778.
Sophia: fem. proper name, from Greek sophia "wisdom," from sophos "wise" (see sophist).
Sophie: French form of Sophia (q.v.).
sophism (n.): mid-14c., "specious but fallacious argument," from Old French sophime "a fallacy, false argument," from Latin sophisma, from Greek sophisma "sophism, clever device," from sophizesthai "become wise" (see sophist).
sophist (n.): 1540s, earlier sophister (late 14c.), from Latin sophista, sophistes, from Greek sophistes, from sophizesthai "to become wise or learned," from sophos "wise, clever," of unknown origin. Greek sophistes came to mean "one who gives intellectual instruction for pay," and, contrasted with "philosopher," it became a term of contempt. Ancient sophists were famous for their clever, specious arguments.
sophistic (adj.): 1540s, from Latin sophisticus, from Greek sophistikos, from sophistes (see sophist). Related: Sophistical (late 15c.); sophistically (late 14c.).
sophisticate (v.): c.1400, from past participle stem of Medieval Latin sophisticare (see sophistication). As a noun, from 1923.
sophisticated (adj.): c.1600, "mixed with a foreign substance, impure; no longer simple or natural," past participle adjective from sophisticate (v.). Of persons, with a positive sense, "worldly-wide, discriminating," from 1895.
sophistication (n.): c.1400, "use or employment of sophistry," from Medieval Latin sophisticationem (nominative sophisticatio), from sophisticare "adulterate, cheat quibble," from Latin sophisticus "of sophists," from Greek sophistikos "of or pertaining to a sophist," from sophistes "a wise man, master, teacher" (see sophist). Meaning "wordly wisdom, refinement, discrimination" is attested from 1850.
sophistry (n.): mid-14c., from Old French sophistrie, from Medieval Latin sophistria, from Latin sophista, sophistes (see sophist).
Sophocles: Athenian tragic poet (c.496-406 B.C.E.), the name is Greek Sophokles, literally "famed for wisdom," from sophos "wise" (see sophist) + *-kles "fame" (see Damocles).
sophomore (n.): 1680s, "student in the second year of university study," literally "arguer," altered from sophumer (1650s, from sophume, archaic variant form of sophism), probably by influence of folk etymology derivation from Greek sophos "wise" + moros "foolish, dull." Short form soph is attested from 1778.
sophomoric (adj.): "characteristic of a sophomore" (regarded as self-assured and opinionated but crude and immature), 1837, from sophomore + -ic.
Sophronia: fem. proper name, from Greek sophronia, from sophron (genitive sophronos) "discreet, prudent," properly "of sound mind," from sos "safe, sound, whole" + phren "midriff, heart, mind."
sophrosyne (n.): Greek, "prudence, moderation," from sophron "of sound mind, prudent" (see Sophronia).
sopor (n.): Latin, "deep sleep, lethargy" (see somnolence).