- This term is likely formed on analogy to forever but only after a reanalysis of forever as four + ever. This is likely due to the homonymy between for and four. Once reanalyzed, speakers changed four to five to indicate a longer period of time than forever. This also indicates a possible domain shit of the numbers to the temporal domain.
5ever
noun; analogy with reanalysis
a period of time longer than forever
Etymology : from five (from PIE *penkwe- 'five') and ever (of uncertain origin with no cognates in other Germanic languages)
Source : (October): “This homework is taking me 5ever.” (A student in my math class)
Last modified: 30 November 2017