offshoot

UK/ˈɒf.ʃuːt/US/ˈɔf.ʃuːt/

nounC1Rare in speech; mostly a word you read · #13,532 of 15,258mostly written

Other forms: offshoots

An offshoot is a branch growing from a main stem or organisation. An offshoot of the company, a political offshoot, offshoots of the plant.

The image is botanical and the figurative use is now commoner — an offshoot of a church or a firm carries the sense of having grown from it rather than been founded fresh. Note the compound of off and shoot.

Definitions of offshoot

1nounoffshootA branch growing from a main stem or organisation.C1
“The charity began as an offshoot of a local church group.”

offshoot is a branch.

Where it comes from

Middle English
scheten
English
shoot
English, today
offshoot

Built from

*(s)kewd- · Proto-Indo-European — to shoot, throw

From off- + shoot. shoot comes from Middle English scheten. Middle English scheten,schoten, from Old English scēotan, from Proto-West Germanic skeutan, from Proto-Germanic skeutaną, from Proto-Indo-European (s)kéwd-e-ti, thematic present of (s)kewd- (“to shoot, throw”). 2

Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA

Practised in A Song of Ice and Fire

Practise this word

offshoot in the wild

Ganges Chasma is an offshoot of Eos Chasma.
Eos Chasma
The tribe traces its linkages as an offshoot of the Samma tribe in Sindh.
Khaskheli
Groups include the Bena of Njombe highlands and their offshoot, the Bena of Ulanga.
Bena people
Pinsk-Karlin is a Hasidic group that is an offshoot of Karlin-Stolin.
Pinsk-Karlin
The Times print version was an offshoot of Sunday Times, to whose subscribers it was delivered gratis; non-subscribers paid R2.50 per edition in the early years.
TimesLIVE

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From Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0. These sentences were written by other people about their own subjects; they are here to show the word at work, not as anybody’s opinion.

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