Fridge
/frɪdʒ/noun
A refrigerator, especially a household appliance used to keep food and drinks cold.
Did you know?“Fridge” is a 20th-century shortening of “refrigerator,” while the deeper root traces back to Latin frigus, meaning “cold.”
Etymological Timeline
Proto-Indo-European
PIE
*sreg-
“To become cold or cause to cool; the reconstructed ancestral root associated with Latin cold-words.”
Classical Latin
Latin
frigus
“Cold or coldness.”
Classical Latin
Latin
refrigerare
“To make cool again, formed from re- (“again”) and frigus (“cold”).”
Middle English
English
refrigeren
“To cool or refresh; borrowed through Anglo-French and Latin influence.”
19th Century
English
refrigerator
“An apparatus or cabinet for preserving food by cooling it.”
20th Century
English
fridge
“A shortened colloquial form of refrigerator.”
Explore more surprising origins