2823: Sturdy: Unsturdy Etymologies Sep 12, 2024

The word sturdy, as most adjectives with a -y ending, would imply that there is a word ‘sturd’, which doesn’t exist, but actually the situation is more complicated; it comes from the Old French word ‘estourdi’ (now ‘etourdi’), which would explain English spelling, except that Middle English had ‘sturdy’ with the -y. The problem with this answer is that the Modern English, Middle English, and Old French words all mean completely different things: firm, powerful - with both valiant and tyrannical connotations, and dazed, respectively. 

In the case of Middle English to Modern English, that change of meanings is relatively easy to grasp, especially that it seems to have been influenced by another word ‘stor’ that also meant ‘bold’ or ‘sturdy’, and that the meanings over time merged and narrowed. It is not clear how the Old French origins led to this though. Complicating the origins yet further, ‘estourdi’ would appear to be the result of the natural evolution from the Latin “ex- + turdus” meaning “out of/ through a thrush”, as in the bird. The best explanation, semantically, is that the thrush in some way connoted drunkenness, leading to the sense of ‘dazed’, as in someone who has suffered a strong blow to the head. This sense of strength or firmness may have led to ‘sturdy’ as we have it in English.

It could also be that the original sense in English, including the idea of ‘rough’ or ‘coarse’, came from a connotation of drunkenness, which then evolved to mean “strong/firm.” However, this is not clear, and no one knows exactly how it came to take on an almost opposite meaning from the Old French. Despite a plethora of historical and linguistic explanations, major bodies like the Oxford and Cambridge dictionaries do not consider these theories plausible.