Catalog

How to spell catalog

7 letters · 3 syllables

How to pronounce catalog

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does catalog mean?

1. nounA complete, systematic list of items, such as goods for sale or works in a collection, usually with descriptions.
2. verbTo arrange or record items in a systematic list.

Catalog in a sentence

• noun

  The store mailed a thick catalog of holiday gifts to every customer.

• verb

  The intern will catalog every donated book by author and subject.

• noun

  She searched the library catalog for the title before walking to the shelves.

• verb

  Researchers catalog each fossil as soon as it leaves the dig site.

Where does catalog come from?

Language of origin: Greek

This word goes back to the Greek katalogos, meaning 'a list, a register, or an enrolment', which was built from the verb katalegein, 'to pick out, to count up, or to enrol'. That verb joined kata, meaning 'down' or 'completely', with legein, 'to choose, gather, or say', so the literal idea was of counting something off completely, item by item. Latin took it up as catalogus, and it passed into English through French around the 1400s, at first describing any orderly written list of names or things. Over time it narrowed toward its familiar modern senses of a systematic list of library holdings or a book of goods for sale. The shorter spelling 'catalog' is the standard American form, dropping the older '-ue' ending that the French route had left behind, which is exactly the spelling decision a writer has to remember.

How the word is built

• cata- (down, completely, from Greek kata)
• log (from legein/logos: to pick out, to count, an account)

British and American spelling

Catalog is the American spelling. British English spells it catalogue.