Other forms: ankles
The ankle is the thin joint between your foot and your leg. Sprain your ankle, ankle deep, a weak ankle.
It carries the whole body weight through a small joint, which is why sprains are so common — rolling it outwards stretches the ligaments on the outside. Ankle deep is a standard measure of shallow water. Note that the word is Germanic and related to angle, from a root meaning a bend.
1nounankleThe joint between the foot and the leg.
“She slipped on the ice and twisted her ankle.”
ankle is a joint.
Old English ancol comes from a Germanic root meaning to bend. Angle and anchor come from related bends.
Middle English
ancle
English, today
ankle
Built from
From Middle English ancle. From Middle English ankel, ancle, ankyll, from Old English ancol (compare anclēow (“ankle”) > Modern English anclef, ancliff, ancley), from Proto-West Germanic ankul, from Proto-Germanic ankulaz (“ankle”); akin to Icelandic ökkla, ökli, Danish and Swedish ankel, Dutch enkel, enklaauw, German Enkel, Old Norse akka, Old Frisian anckel, and perhaps Old High German encha, ancha (“thigh, shin”), from the Proto-Germanic ankijǭ (“ankle, joint”). Compare with Sanskrit अङ्ग (“limb”), अङ्गुरि (“finger”), Latin angulus. Compare haunch and Greek prefix ἀγκυλο- (“joint, crooked, bent”). a doublet of angulus and angle.
Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA