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Origin and history of parchment

parchment(n.)

c. 1300, parchemin (c. 1200 as a surname), "the skin of sheep or goats prepared for use as writing material," from Old French parchemin (11c., Old North French parcamin) and directly from Medieval Latin pergamentum, percamentum, from Late Latin pergamena "parchment," a noun use of an adjective (as in pergamena charta, attested in Pliny), from Late Greek pergamenon "of Pergamon," from Pergamon "Pergamum" (modern Bergama), the city in Mysia in Asia Minor where parchment supposedly first was adopted as a substitute for papyrus in 2c. B.C.E.

The form of the word was possibly influenced in Vulgar Latin by Latin parthica (pellis) "Parthian (leather)." The unetymological Middle English -t probably is by influence of words in -ent (compare ancient) and by influence of Medieval Latin collateral form pergamentum.

Technological advances in the production of cheap paper eventually restricted parchment's use largely to formal documents, hence parchment in the sense of "a certificate" (by 1888).

also from c. 1300

Entries linking to parchment

ancient(adj.)

late 14c., auncyen, of persons, "very old;" c. 1400, of things, "having lasted from a remote period," from Old French ancien "old, long-standing, ancient," from Vulgar Latin *anteanus, literally "from before," adjectivization of Latin ante "before, in front of, against" (from PIE *anti "against," locative singular of root *ant- "front, forehead").

From early 15c. as "existing or occurring in times long past." Specifically, in history, "belonging to the period before the fall of the Western Roman Empire" (c. 1600, contrasted with medieval and modern). In English law, "from before the Norman Conquest."

As a noun, "very old person," late 14c.; "one who lived in former ages," 1530s. Ancient of Days "supreme being" is from Daniel vii.9. Related: Anciently.

The unetymological -t dates from 15c. and probably is from confusion with or by influence of words in -ent, -ant (suffix of nouns formed from present participles of verbs in first Latin conjugation).

The same process affected cormorant, parchment, pageant, peasant (in French), pheasant, tyrant (in French), also talaunt, former Middle English variant of talon, etc.and perhaps also currant, truant, pennant, allowing them to "simulate Latin endings to which, etymologically, they have no right." [Fitzedward Hall, "Modern English," 1873]

-ent

word-forming element making adjectives from nouns or verbs, from French -ent and directly from Latin -entem (nominative -ens), present-participle ending of verbs in -ere/-ire. Old French changed it in many words to -ant, but after c. 1500 some of these in English were changed back to what was supposed to be correct Latin. See -ant.

biblio-

word-forming element meaning "book" or sometimes "Bible," from Greek biblion "paper, scroll," also the ordinary word for "a book as a division of a larger work;" originally a diminutive of byblos "Egyptian papyrus." This is perhaps from Byblos, the Phoenician port from which Egyptian papyrus was exported to Greece (modern Jebeil, in Lebanon; for sense evolution compare parchment). Or the place name might be from the Greek word, which then would be probably of Egyptian origin. Compare Bible. Latin liber (see library) and English book also are ultimately from plant-words.