Gluten
nounA protein found in wheat and some other grains that gives dough its elasticity and that some people cannot tolerate.
How to spell gluten
6 letters · 2 syllables
How to pronounce gluten
Say the part in capitals loudest.
What does gluten mean?
- nounA protein found in wheat and some other grains that gives dough its elasticity and that some people cannot tolerate.
Gluten in a sentence
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The bakery labels every loaf that contains gluten for allergy-conscious customers.
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Her doctor advised her to avoid gluten after the coeliac diagnosis.
Where does gluten come from?
Language of origin: Latin
This word comes straight from the Latin gluten, which literally meant 'glue' or 'a sticky substance'. The name is fitting, because gluten is the stretchy, gluey protein network that forms when flour is mixed with water and that gives bread dough its elastic, binding quality. Latin borrowed the term into English in the early 1600s, originally as a general word for any sticky, glue-like matter before it settled into its modern food-science meaning. The very same Latin root sits behind the everyday word 'glue' (which reached English through Old French glu) and behind 'agglutinate', meaning to stick together. Keeping the Latin glue in mind helps with the spelling: it is glut-en with a single 't', not the double 't' of the unrelated word 'glutton', which describes a greedy eater.
How the word is built
- glut- (from Latin gluten: glue)
- -en (noun ending)
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