umbrella [E17th] An umbrella is strictly a sunshade. The word came from Italy in the early 17th century, and goes back to Latin umbra ‘shade’. Britain’s wet weather meant that not much more than twenty years after the word’s first appearance an umbrella became something to keep the rain off. Another word from umbra is umbrage [LME], as in take umbrage or take offence. An early sense was ‘a shadowy outline’, which then gave rise to ‘a ground for suspicion’ and led to the current sense.