Truth

How to spell truth

5 letters · 1 syllable

How to pronounce truth

What does truth mean?

1. nounThat which is in accordance with fact or reality; a verified or accepted statement of what is the case.

Truth in a sentence

• The witness swore to tell the truth in court.

• After months of rumours, the company finally admitted the truth about the layoffs.

Where does truth come from?

Language of origin: Germanic

Truth comes from the Old English triewth or treowth, meaning faithfulness, fidelity, or a solemn pledge. It was built from the adjective triewe, meaning faithful, trustworthy, or honest, combined with the noun-forming suffix -th that turns a quality into an abstract noun, the same pattern seen in 'warmth' and 'strength'. The earliest senses leaned heavily toward loyalty and keeping one's word rather than factual accuracy; a person of 'truth' was someone who honoured a promise. Over the medieval period the meaning gradually shifted toward conformity with reality and what is genuinely the case, which is the dominant modern sense. The word is closely related to 'troth', the old term for a betrothal pledge, and to 'true' itself, all rooted in the same Germanic family. That shared origin explains why the spelling keeps the 'tru-' of 'true' and simply adds the quiet -th ending.

How the word is built

• true (from Old English triewe: faithful, honest)
• -th (noun-forming suffix denoting a state or quality)