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Origin and history of tardigrade

tardigrade(adj.)

"slow-going, slow-moving, having a slow pace or motion," 1620s, from French tardigrade (17c.), from Latin tardigradus "slow-paced," from tardus "slow" (see tardy) + gradi "to walk, go, step" (from PIE root *ghredh- "to walk, go"). In zoology, in reference to sloths, by 1799. Related: Tardigradous.

also from 1620s

Entries linking to tardigrade

tardy(adj.)

late 15c., "slow, moving with a slow pace or motion," from Old French tardif "slow, late" (12c.), also the name of the snail character in the Roman de Renart, from Vulgar Latin *tardivus, from Latin tardus "slow, sluggish; late; dull, stupid," a word of unknown origin; de Vaan gives it "no etymology."

The meaning "late, not acting or happening until after the proper or expected time" in English is from 1660s.

This word, not much used in English prose, is constantly employed in the U.S. and in Canada with reference to lateness in school-attendance. [Thornton, "American Glossary," 1912]

Related: Tardily; tardiness. Earlier forms of the word in English were tardif, tardyve (late 15c.). Modern tardive "characterized by laxness; tending to be late," 1905, is said to be a new borrowing from French. Seventeenth-century English lexicons (Blount. Coles, Cockeram) have tardiloquent "speaking slowly, drawling."

*ghredh-

Proto-Indo-European root meaning "to walk, go." 

It might form all or part of: aggress; aggression; aggressive; centigrade; congress; degrade; degree; degression; digress; digression; egress; gradation; grade; gradual; graduate; grallatorial; gravigrade; ingredient; ingress; plantigrade; progress; progression; regress; regression; retrograde; retrogress; tardigrade; transgress; transgression.

It might also be the source of: Latin gradus "a step, a pace, gait," figuratively "a step toward something, a degree of something rising by stages;" gradi "to walk, step, go;" Lithuanian gridiju, gridyti "to go, wander;" Old Church Slavonic gredo "to come;" Old Irish in-greinn "he pursues."

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