July 05, 2008, 11:55
<Asa Lovejoy>Can one buy tires in Tyre?
I'm curious as to why the word, "tire," which seems to be a shortened form of "attire," got to be spelled "tyre" in British English. From what little research I did, "tire" is the earlier form.
Asa, wondering if tyres roll better in Tyrolia
July 06, 2008, 14:12
arnie Etymology Online says that the earliest spelling was
tyre.
July 06, 2008, 14:31
tinmanThe OED Online says they were spelled "indifferently" from the 15th to the 17th century.
quote:
tire, n.2
[Probably the same word as prec., the tire being originally (sense 1) the ‘attire’, ‘clothing’, or ‘accoutrement’ of the wheel. From 15th to 17th c. spelt (like prec.) tire and tyre indifferently. Before 1700 tyre became generally obsolete, and tire remained as the regular form, as it still does in America; but in Great Britain tyre was revived in the nineteenth cent. as the popular term for the rubber rim of bicycle, tricycle, carriage, or motor-car wheels, and is sometimes used for the steel tires of locomotive wheels. During the twentieth cent. tyre became standard in the British Isles.]
I'm tyred now. I think I'll go lie down.