Aunty

How to spell aunty

5 letters · 2 syllables

How to pronounce aunty

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does aunty mean?

1. nounAn affectionate or informal name for an aunt, the sister of one's mother or father.

Aunty in a sentence

• Every summer we stayed with my aunty in the countryside.

• The children ran to greet their favourite aunty at the door.

Where does aunty come from?

Language of origin: French

This is the affectionate, informal form of 'aunt', which came into English in the early 1300s from the Anglo-Norman and Old French 'aunte'. That word descended from the Latin 'amita', meaning 'a father's sister', a term thought to have begun life as a child's babbling word for a beloved older woman, much like 'mama' and 'papa'. The familiar ending '-y' (also spelled '-ie') was attached far later, in the same way that 'mum' becomes 'mummy', to give a warm, domestic flavour. The silent middle of the spelling is the real trap: the 'au' is pronounced as a single broad vowel, so writers can be tempted to drop a letter. English happily keeps both 'aunty' and 'auntie' as accepted variants, which is why the ending feels uncertain.

How the word is built

• aunt (parent's sister)
• -y (familiar/diminutive suffix)