grammar

Meanings

1. 1
   noun

   The rules for how words are formed and combined into sentences in a language.

   English grammar can be hard for beginners.

2. 2
   noun

   The branch of linguistics that studies these rules.

   She teaches grammar at the university.

3. 3
   noun

   The basic rules or principles of a particular skill or field.

   Learning the grammar of music takes years of practice.

4. 4
   noun

   A book that describes the rules of a language.

   He bought a French grammar to study at home.

Appears in

Simplified etymology

Grammar entered Middle English through a word ultimately derived from Greek gramma, “a letter of the alphabet” or “something written.” In medieval use it could mean scholarship or learning; popular associations between learned books, astrology, and magic led to the Scots alteration glamour, originally meaning an enchantment or spell.

From Middle English gramere, from Old French gramaire (“classical learning”), from unattested Vulgar Latin *grammāria, an alteration of Latin grammatica, from Ancient Greek γραμματική (grammatikḗ, “skilled in writing”), from γράμμα (grámma, “line of writing”), from γράφω (gráphō, “write”), from Proto-Indo-European *gerbʰ- (“to carve, scratch”). Displaced native Old English stæfcræft; a doublet of glamour, glamoury, gramarye, and grimoire. Piecewise doublet of grammatic.

Topics

External links

• Google Images
• Cambridge Dictionary
• Wiktionary