utter

Meanings

1. 1
   adj

   Complete and total, used to emphasize how extreme something is.

   The meeting was an utter waste of time.

2. 2
   verb

   To say something or make a sound with your voice.

   She was so shocked that she could not utter a single word.

Simplified etymology

English has two words spelled utter. The adjective comes from Old English uttra, “outer,” the comparative of ut, “out.” It was widely used in the sense “outer” from about 1400 to 1620, while the sense “extreme, complete” became common from about 1515. The verb entered late Middle English from Middle Dutch. An early, now obsolete sense was “put goods on the market, sell”; later senses included circulating money as legal tender and publishing. Its underlying notion of “put forth” also appears in the senses “declare” and “speak.”

PIE word *úd From Middle English outren, utteren (“to display for sale; to market; to sell; to say, speak; to put into words, express, tell; to make known, reveal”), partly: * from outre, utter (adjective, adverb) (see etymology 1 and etymology 3) + -en (suffix forming the infinitives of verbs); and * from Middle Dutch uteren (“to announce, make known”) (modern Dutch uiteren); or from Middle Low German üteren, ütern (“to demonstrate, show; to speak; to sell; etc.”) (modern Low German ütern), from Old Dutch or Old Saxon ūtan, probably from Proto-West Germanic *ūtanā (“from outside or without;…

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