novel

\ \ English has acquired the word novel in several distinct instalments. First to arrive was the adjective, ‘new’ [15], which came via Old French from Latin novellus, a derivative of novus ‘new’ (to which English new is distantly related). (The Old French derived noun novelte had already reached English as novelty [14].) Next on the scene was a now obsolete noun novel ‘new thing, novelty’ [15], which went back to Latin novella, a noun use of the neuter plural of novellus. In Italian, novellus became novello, and this was used in storia novella, literally ‘new story’, a term which denoted ‘short story’.

\ \ English adopted this as a third novel [16], at first referring specifically to Italian short stories of the type written by Boccaccio, but by the mid- 17th century being extended to a longer ‘prose narrative’ (the original Italian novella was reborrowed in the early 20th century for a ‘short novel’). English is also indebted to Latin novus for nova [19] (etymologically a ‘new star’) and novice [14].