Midst

How to spell midst

5 letters · 1 syllable

How to pronounce midst

What does midst mean?

1. nounThe middle part or point of something, especially used in the phrase 'in the midst of' to mean during or surrounded by.

Midst in a sentence

• In the midst of the budget review, her laptop crashed.

• The family moved house in the midst of a freezing winter.

Where does midst come from?

Language of origin: Germanic

Midst comes from the Old English word 'midde', meaning 'the middle', which itself traces back to a common Germanic root for the central point of something. In Middle English the phrase 'in middes' (in the middle of) was common, and over time an extra 't' attached itself to the end, giving 'middest' and then the compact 'midst' we use now; this stray 't' is what makes the word easy to misspell. The same 'mid' root sits inside everyday relatives such as 'middle', 'amid', and 'amidst', all pointing to a central position. By the late medieval period 'midst' had settled into its modern role, almost always appearing in the fixed phrase 'in the midst of'. The added 't' is purely a quirk of spelling history rather than a separate piece of meaning, so it pays to remember that midst ends in '-dst', not the simpler '-st' of 'mist'.

How the word is built

• mid (middle)
• -st (from older -es genitive plus an added t)