Screen1
- Mid-14th c., from a Germanic source — probably Middle Dutch scherm ‘screen, cover, shield’, via Old North French escren / Old French escran ‘fire-screen’; akin to Old High German skirm, skerm ‘shield, protection’, from Proto-Germanic *skirmjanan, ultimately the PIE root *sker- ‘to cut’.
- Something that shelters, protects, separates, or conceals; a fixed or movable partition.
- A surface on which the images of a film or other projection are made to appear.
- In an electronic device, the surface on which images and data are displayed.
What do our screens protect us from?
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Screen, Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/screen, and Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com/word/screen (accessed 16 June 2026). Curiously, English screen and Italian schermo descend from the same Germanic root (*skirm- ‘shield, protection’), whereas Catalan and Spanish pantalla take a different, Romance route (probably an alteration of ventalla under the influence of pàmpol): at its root the word means protection, and each language screens the other. ⤶