The word 'story' originates from the Anglo-Norman and Old French 'estorie', meaning a chronicle or history, which itself was borrowed from the Latin 'historia' (inquiry, history, tale). This Latin term derives from the Ancient Greek 'ἱστορία' (historía), signifying inquiry or knowledge acquired by investigation, from the root 'ἵστωρ' (hístōr), meaning a wise or learned man. The semantic journey from 'inquiry' and 'historical account' to a more general 'narrative tale' occurred in medieval Latin and Romance languages, with the English word 'story' fully specializing to mean a fictional or entertaining narrative, while its doublet 'history' retained the sense of a factual record.

The word 'story' is a simplex word derived from the Anglo-Norman/Old French 'estorie', which itself came from the Latin 'historia'. It is not productively segmentable into meaningful morphemes in modern English spelling.