Etymology: < alarm n. Compare French alarmer (a1620).Quot. 1485 at sense 1 may alternatively show a formation < all adv. + armed adj.¹ (compare the reading of the Winchester manuscript). With sense 8 compare earlier alarmed adj.²

Etymology: < Middle French à l'arme, alarme (French alarme ) (interjection) ‘to arms!’, as a warning of enemy attack (early 14th cent. in Old French), (noun) a call to arms, fear, panic, disquiet (1470), audible signal to take up arms (1569 of a trumpet sonner a l'arme ), probably (despite the chronology) < Italian allarme , †all' arme (interjection) ‘to arms!’ (a1348), (noun) a cry or signal summoning people to arms (1532), fear, apprehensiveness (end of the 17th cent.) < a to + l' , variant before a vowel of le , plural definite article + arme , plural of arma arms n. Compare Catalan alarma , noun (1555), Spanish alarma , interjection and noun (1st half of the 16th cent. or earlier), Portuguese alarma (13th cent.). Compare earlier as arms int. and larum n.Form history. Although word division is inconsistent in medieval manuscripts, some cases of α. and β. forms written with a space or hyphen following the initial a- may originally reflect the word division of Middle French à l'arme ; some later instances probably show analysis of the initial sound of the word as the indefinite article a adj.; β. forms of this type subsequently give rise to larum n. The trisyllabic β. forms show an epenthetic vowel between -r- and -m- , perhaps arising from rolling of the -r- in the final syllable of the call. In γ. forms with an apostrophe probably immediately after Italian all' arme ; the γ. forms with final -y probably reflect an attempt to render the pronunciation of Italian arme arms, although perhaps compare army n. Spellings with a space or hyphen following initial al- , all- may reflect the orthography of Italian †all' arme and hence belong with the γ. forms, although some instances (especially those in all- ) may rather arise from analysis of the interjection as all arm! (see all pron. and n. and arm v.¹ 2b). Pronunciation history. Since the beginning of the 20th cent., the form alarm has been the most common in all the major current senses of the word, with β. forms generally either restricted to regional, archaic, and historical use and to a few particular expressions (notably alarums and excursions at Phrases 2), or used for rhetorical effect. The pronunciation of the β. forms appears to have shown variation in most periods, some of which persists into the 20th and 21st centuries. N.E.D. (1884) noted that the earlier pronunciation, /əˈlɑːrəm/, had been superseded by /əˈlɛərəm/ and /əˈlærəm/. Pronouncing dictionaries from the late 18th and early 19th cent. uniformly indicate pronunciation with /ɑː/, with /əˈlærəm/ documented from the 2nd half of the 19th cent. (e.g. as the only pronunciation given in Cooley (1861) and the first listed in both the Cent. Dict. (1890) and editions of Webster from 1911 until 1963). The evidence provided by rhyme indicates that the pronunciation /əˈlɛərəm/ was in use as early as the 17th cent.; compare:1658 R. Brathwait Age of Apes in Honest Ghost 244 For three daies space together sounds alarum, (A gentle easie summons to prepare him.)1743 H. Fielding Misc. I. 67 Like Mortal Cryer's loud Alarum, Bring in Petitions from New Sarum. This pronunciation is preferred in all editions of D. Jones Eng. Pronouncing Dict. since 1917, first alongside /əˈlɑːrəm/ and from 1947 also /əˈlærəm/, and is also the type preferred in editions of Webster from 1964, while the Oxf. Dict. Pronunc. for Current English (2001) gives only the pronunciation with /ɑː/. Compare further larum n. Borrowings into other Germanic languages. Compare Dutch alarm, †allarm call to arms, danger signal (early 16th cent.; 2nd half of the 15th cent. in Middle Dutch in roepen alarme to make a din with a loud voice; also as interjection), Middle Low German allārm, allerm, alārme, alārum call to arms, uproar, military disturbance, German Alarm, interjection (early 15th cent.) and noun (beginning of the 16th cent. in senses ‘military signal warning of danger’ and ‘distress, panic, uproar’, early 17th cent. in sense ‘situation of acute danger or high alert’; formerly also as †Alarma, Allarm, Alerm, Allerm, etc.), Swedish alarm call to arms, danger signal, uproar (1st half of the 16th cent.), all probably < French.