Machine is French borrowed late enough to keep the French sound: the ch says sh, not ch as in church. That single detail dates it. English took chamber and chief from French before about 1400, when the ch was still ch; it took machine in the 1540s, chef in 1842, and chandelier and chauffeur later still, all with the modern French sh.
Behind the French is Latin machina and behind that Greek makhana, "device, tool, machine," and also "contrivance, cunning" — the same double sense English keeps in machination. The traditional etymology derives it from a root meaning "to be able, to have power," though one recent scholar thinks the Greek word is isolated and was borrowed into Greek from something older. The modern sense of a device of moving parts applying mechanical power is only from the 1670s; before that a machine was any structure, apparatus or siege tower.
machine (n.) 1540s, "structure of any kind," from Middle French machine "device, contrivance," from Latin machina "machine, engine, military machine; device, trick; instrument" (source also of Spanish maquina , Italian macchina ), from Greek makhana , Doric variant of Attic mēkhanē "device, tool, machine;" also "contrivance, cunning," traditionally (Watkins) from PIE *magh-ana- "that which enables," from root *magh- "to be able, have power." But Beekes, on formal grounds, objects to the connection to words in Germanic and Slavic. He finds the Greek word isolated and is convinced that it is Pre-Greek. Main modern sense of "device made of moving parts for applying mechanical power" (1670s) probably grew out of mid-17c. senses of "apparatus, appliance" and "military siege-tower." It gradually came to be applied to an apparatus that works without the strength or skill of the workman. From 17c.-19c. also "a vehicle; a stage- or mail-coach; a ship," and, from 1901, "a motor-car." Also in late 19c. slang the word was used for both "penis" and "vagina," one of the few so honored. The political sense "a strict organization of the working members of a political party to secure a predominating influence for themselves and their associates" is U.S. slang, attested by 1876. Machine age , a time notable for the extensive use of mechanical devices, is attested by 1882, though there is this: The idea of remodelling society at public meetings is one of the least reasonable which ever entered the mind of an agitator: and the notion that the relations of the sexes can be re-arranged and finally disposed of by preamble and resolution, is one of the latest, as it should have been the last, vagary of a machine age. ["The Literary World," Nov. 1, 1851] Machine for living (in) "house" translates Le Corbusier's machine à habiter (1923). also from 1540s machine (v.) mid-15c., "decide, resolve," from Old French and Latin usages, from Latin machina "machine, engine, military machine; device, trick; instrument," from Greek makhana , Doric variant of Attic mēkhanē "device, tool; contrivance, cunning" (see machine (n.)). Meaning "to apply machinery to, to make or form on or by the aid of a machine" is from 1878. Related: Machined ; machining . also from mid-15c.
machine came in through Later and wider borrowings, and its spelling follows that family's conventions.
How that family writes these sounds
| /ʃ/ in a modern French loan | chmachine, chef |
What gives it away on the page
| -eau, -oir/-oire, ch said as /ʃ/, silent final consonant | Modern French — borrowed after French itself stopped pronouncing final consonants.bureau, memoir, machine, chef, ballet, debut, gourmet |
Placing it without the spelling
| /ʃ/ where an older loan would have said /tʃ/ | Modern French, borrowed after the sound shiftedmachine, chef |
Later and wider borrowings in the spelling guide · guess another word's family