much
/mʌt͡ʃ/
Word Rarity
Common
Frequency: Zipf frequency 6.00 in modern English
11
Scrabble Score
4
Letters
1
Syllables
4
Unique Chars
Meaning
adv
adv
Example Sentences
- "Do you think I have much chance of catching the train on time?"
- "After much discussion, we decided to set about the task with much enthusiasm."
- "Did you do much running last summer?"
- "As it was, he did nothing with much zeal, but sport; and his time was otherwise trifled away, without benefit from books or anything else."
- "Unless matters take a nastier turn, neither side has much incentive to compromise."
- "Add this much water and no more."
Etymology
Etymology tree Proto-Indo-European *méǵh₂s Proto-Indo-European *-lósder. Proto-Germanic *-ilaz Proto-Germanic *mikilaz Proto-West Germanic *mikil Old English miċel Middle English muchel Middle English muche English much From Middle English muche (“much, great”), apocopated variant of muchel (“much, great”), from Old English myċel, miċel (“big, much”), from Proto-West Germanic *mikil, from Proto-Germanic *mikilaz (“great, many, much”), from Proto-Indo-European *meǵh₂- (“big, stour, great”). See also mickle, muckle. Cognates Cognate with Scots mickle, mukill, mekil, mikil (“big, large, great, much”), Middle Dutch mēkel (“great, many, much”), Middle High German michel ("great, many, much"; > German michel (“great, big, large”)), Norwegian Bokmål mye (“much”), Norwegian Nynorsk mykje (“much”), Swedish mycket (“much”), Danish meget (“much”), Gothic 𐌼𐌹𐌺𐌹𐌻𐍃 (mikils, “great, many”), Ancient Greek μέγας (mégas, “large, great”), Modern Greek μεγάλος (megálos, “large, great”). Note that English much is not related to Spanish mucho, and their resemblance in both form and meaning is purely coincidental, as mucho derives from Latin multus and is not related to the Germanic forms. Instead, related to Spanish maño.
Origin
Word Breakdown
- Root: muche, myċel, *mikil, *mikilaz, *meǵh₂-, Much
Regional Pronunciation
- American English: /mʌt͡ʃ/
- British English: /mʌt͡ʃ/