culprit

Meanings

1. 1
   noun

   a person responsible for a crime, wrongdoing, or problem

   Investigators identified the culprit from the security footage.

2. 2
   noun

   the thing that causes a problem or undesirable result

   A loose connection was the culprit behind the intermittent power loss.

Simplified etymology

Culprit, first recorded in the late 17th century, may have arisen from a misreading of the courtroom abbreviation cul. prist., representing Old French Culpable: prest d’averrer notre bille, roughly “guilty: ready to prove our indictment.” The resulting form came to mean “a guilty person,” perhaps under the influence of culpable, from Latin culpa, “fault” or “blame.”

From the Anglo-Norman legal abbreviation cul. prit, representing culpable: prest, roughly guilty: ready to prove our case. English speakers reinterpreted the formula as a noun for the accused person; Latin culpa, meaning blame, influenced its later associations.

Topics

External links

• Google Images
• Cambridge Dictionary
• Wiktionary