Router

How to spell router

6 letters · 2 syllables

How to pronounce router

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does router mean?

1. nounA device that forwards data between computer networks, typically giving a home or office access to the internet.
2. nounA power tool with a rotating bit used to cut grooves, edges, or hollows in wood.

Router in a sentence

• The broadband router in the hallway kept dropping the connection.

• He guided the router along the edge of the shelf to cut a neat groove.

• After a power cut she had to reset the router to get back online.

• A sharp bit on the router leaves a much cleaner cut in oak.

Where does router come from?

Language of origin: Latin

This word grew out of the verb 'rout' and the noun 'route', both of which trace back to the Latin rupta via, meaning 'a broken or beaten way', that is, a road forced through the landscape; the key word there is rupta, the past participle of rumpere, 'to break'. The noun 'route' reached English through Old French in the 1200s as a word for a course of travel, while the woodworking sense draws on the older verb 'rout', meaning to gouge, scoop, or hollow out. The agent suffix '-er' was added to mean 'a thing that performs the action', giving first the cutting tool that routs a groove in wood, and much later the electronic device that decides which route data packets should travel. The spelling holds steady even though pronunciation splits across the Atlantic: British speakers say it to rhyme with 'outer', while many Americans say the network device to rhyme with 'rooter'. The same rumpere root, 'to break', also underlies 'rupture', 'interrupt', and 'bankrupt', a tidy reminder that a route was originally a way broken open.

How the word is built

• rout (to drive or cut a path)
• -er (agent suffix: a thing that does the action)