pitch

Meanings

1. 1
   verb

   To throw a ball, especially to a batter in baseball.

   He pitched the ball hard across the plate.

2. 2
   noun

   How high or low a sound or musical note is.

   She sang the high note perfectly in pitch.

3. 3
   verb

   To aim something at a particular group or level.

   The teacher pitched the lesson at beginners.

4. 4
   noun

   How steeply something slopes.

   The roof had a very steep pitch.

Appears in

Simplified etymology

Pitch has two unrelated histories. The Old English word for the dark, sticky substance goes back to Latin pix. The Middle English word covering senses such as musical pitch, a playing area, aiming, and fixing something in position has an unknown ultimate origin, and the development connecting its senses remains unclear.

From Middle English picche, piche, pich, from Old English piċ, from Proto-West Germanic *pik, from Latin pix. Cognate with Ancient Greek πίσσα (píssa, “pitch, tar”), Latin pīnus (“pine”). More at pine. Cognate with Saterland Frisian Pik (“pitch, tar”), Dutch pek (“pitch, tar”), German Low German Pick (“pitch, tar”), German Pech (“pitch, tar”), Catalan pega (“pitch”), Spanish pegar (“to stick, glue”), Franco-Provençal pouatche (“sap from a pine”) and French poix (“sap”). The adjective is probably back-formed from pitch-black, reinterpreting "pitch" as meaning "intense(ly)".

Topics

External links

• Google Images
• Cambridge Dictionary
• Wiktionary