mid-air | Search Online Etymology Dictionary

5194 entries found.

also aerogramme, 1899, "message sent through the air" (by radio waves, i.e. "wireless telegraphy"), from aero- + -gram. From 1920 as "air-mail letter."

airship (n.)

also air-ship, 1819, from air (n.1) + ship (n.). From 1888 as a translation of German Luftschiff "motor-driver dirigible."

airplane (n.)

1907, air-plane, from air (n.1) + plane (n.1); though the earliest uses are British, the word caught on in American English, where it largely superseded earlier aeroplane (1873 in this sense and still common in British English). Aircraft as "airplane" also is from 1907. Lord Byron, speculating on future travel, used air-vessel (1822); and in 1865 aeromotive (based on locomotive) was used, also air-boat (1870).

pneumato-

before vowels pneumat-, word-forming element meaning "wind, air, spirit, presence of air," from Greek pneuma (genitive pneumatos) "the wind," also "breath" (see pneuma).

TWA

formed May 16, 1928, as Transcontinental Air Transport, merged 1930 with Western Air Express to form Transcontinental and Western Air Inc. (TWA). Name changed to Trans World Airlines 1950, but the moniker remained the same. Its last remnants were bought out by rival American Airlines in April 2001.

pneumatic (adj.)

"moved or played by means of air; of or pertaining to air or gases," 1650s, from Latin pneumaticus "of the wind, belonging to the air," from Greek pneumatikos "of wind or air" (which is attested mainly as "of spirit, spiritual"), from pneuma (genitive pneumatos) "the wind," also "breath" (see pneuma). Earlier was pneumatical (c. 1600). The pneumatic-dispatch tube was so called by 1859 (in Paris, pneumatique).

SAM (n.)

1958, acronym for surface to air missile.

aerate (v.)

"cause to mix with carbonic acid or other gas," 1794 (implied in aerated), from aer/aër (used in old science for specific kinds of air, a sense later given to gas (n.1)), from Latin aer (see air (n.1)) + verbal suffix -ate (2). Meaning "expose to air" is from 1799, probably a back-formation from aeration. Related: Aerating.

Luftwaffe

air arm of the German Wehrmacht in the World War II era, 1935, from German Luftwaffe, literally "air-weapon," from Luft (see loft (n.)) + Waffe (see weapon (n.)).

abbreviation of air conditioning, by 1966.

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