combat (v.)
1560s, "to fight, struggle, contend" (intransitive), from French combat (16c.), from Old French combattre (12c.), from Late Latin combattere, from Latin com "with (each other)," see com-, + battuere "to beat, fight" (see batter (v.)). Transitive sense is from 1580s; figurative sense from 1620s. Related: Combated; combating; combatted; combatting.
combat (n.)
1560s, "a fight," originally especially "a fight between two armed persons" (later distinguished as single combat, 1620s), also in a general sense of "any struggle or fight between opposing forces," from French combat (see combat (v.)).
Entries linking to combat
word-forming element usually meaning "with, together," from Latin com, archaic form of classical Latin cum "together, together with, in combination," from PIE *kom- "beside, near, by, with" (compare Old English ge-, German ge-). The prefix in Latin sometimes was used as an intensive.
Before vowels and aspirates, it is reduced to co-; before -g-, it is assimilated to cog- or con-; before -l-, assimilated to col-; before -r-, assimilated to cor-; before -c-, -d-, -j-, -n-, -q-, -s-, -t-, and -v-, it is assimilated to con-, which was so frequent that it often was used as the normal form.
The word began to be widely used in reference to domestic abuse in 1962. Related: Battered; battering. Battering-ram is an ancient weapon (Latin aries), but the phrase is attested only from 1610s.
