Etymologically
Log in

activity

This is the current revision of this entry, as edited by bogdan on 15 October 2026 at 18:13. This address is a permanent link to this version.
Changes in this edit History

Pronunciation

  • IPA: UK /ækˈtɪv.ə.ti/, US /ækˈtɪv.ə.t̬i/[1]

Etymology

It is inherited from Middle English actyvete (“active life”),[2] borrowed from Old French activité (“power of acting”),[3][2][4] from Medieval Latin āctīvitās (“activity”) (accusative āctīvitātem), a word of Scholastic philosophy,[3][2] in Late Latin “the active form of a verb”,[2] from Latin āctīvus (“active”),[3] the source of active, from agere (“to do, drive”).[3][4]

Earliest recorded meaning

The active or secular life: about 1400.[3][2] The SOED dates the word to late Middle English.[4]

Semantic evolution

“The state of being active, briskness, liveliness” is from the 1520s[3] (1530 in the OED),[5] and the general state of being active, the exertion of energy, from 1549.[5] The capacity for acting on matter is from the 1540s.[3] In the 16th and 17th centuries activity also meant physical exercise or athletics.[5] Anything active, an active force or operation, is from 1646.[5] An educational exercise, or the projects in a school curriculum, is by 1923.[3][5] In science it means the rate of decay of a radioactive substance (1903) and the degree to which a substance, such as an enzyme, shows its characteristic effect (1898).[5]

Timeline

  • c. 1400 – the active life.[3]
  • 1530 – briskness, liveliness.[5]
  • 1540s – capacity for acting on matter.[3]
  • 1549 – the state of being active.[5]
  • 1646 – an active force or operation.[5]
  • 1898 – the activity of a substance.[5]
  • 1903 – radioactivity.[5]
  • 1923 – a school activity.[3][5]

Modern meaning

Noun

  1. The state of being active; energetic action or movement.
  2. A particular pursuit or occupation: leisure activities.
  3. An educational exercise designed to teach through experience.
  4. (physics) The rate of decay of a radioactive source.
  5. (chemistry) The ability of a substance, such as an enzyme, to take part in a reaction.

Word family

  • bioactivity
  • hyperactivity
  • preactivity
  • superactivity
  • nonactivity
  • radioactivity
  • self-activity

References

  1. ^ Jones, Daniel (2011), Cambridge English Pronouncing Dictionary, 18th ed., ed. Peter Roach, Jane Setter and John Esling, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press
  2. ^ a b c d e Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
  3. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
  4. ^ a b c Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
  5. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l Simpson, J. A.; Weiner, E. S. C., eds. (1989), The Oxford English Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Clarendon Press