Origin and history of stomach

late 14c. variant of earlier stomake (early 14c.), "the human stomach, internal pouch of the body into which food is digested," from Old French stomaque, estomac "stomach," from Latin stomachus "throat, gullet; stomach," also "taste, inclination, liking; distaste, dislike;" also "pride, indignation," which were thought to have their origin in that organ (source also of Spanish estómago, Italian stomaco), from Greek stomakhos "throat, gullet, esophagus," literally "mouth, opening," from stoma "mouth" (see stoma). The native word is maw (Old English maga glosses stomachus).

Applied anciently to the openings of various internal organs, especially that of the stomach, then by the later Greek physicians to the stomach itself.

Some 16c. anatomists tried to correct the sense of the word back to "esophagus" and introduce ventricle for what we call the stomach. The meaning "belly, midriff, surface of the body over the stomach" is from c. 1400.

In Middle English also stomack, stomac, stommak, stomoke; the spelling of the ending of the word was conformed to Latin regularly from 16c., but the pronunciation remains as in Middle English. A 19c. attempt to make it look as it sounds yielded stummik (1888), stummock.

Related: Stomachal (1580s); stomachical (c. 1600); stomachic (1650s). Stomachous (1540s), stomachate (1540s, from Latin stomachatus) seem to have been used only in figurative senses.

The classical figurative senses also were in Middle English, such as "relish, inclination, desire; courage, spirit; inmost thoughts, consciousness; temper, disposition" (mid-15c.) or early Modern English, when the stomach was regarded as the seat of thought and emotion as well as hunger. It also sometimes was regarded in Middle Ages as the seat of sexual desire.

"tolerate, put up with," 1570s, from stomach (n.), probably in reference to digestion. The earlier sense of the verb was rather opposite, "be offended at, resent" (1520s, now obsolete), echoing Latin stomachari "to be resentful, be irritated, be angry," from stomachus (n.) in its secondary sense of "pride, indignation" (see the noun). For this sense also compare Old English belgan (v.) "to become angry," literally "to belly," probably from the notion of "swelling."

A literal sense of "take into the stomach and digest" is attested from 1822, more or less facetious (Praed, the satirist); OED calls it nonce-use." Related: Stomached; stomaching.