aggrieve

Etymology

It is inherited from Middle English agreven,^[2][3][4] borrowed from Anglo-Norman agrever, also Middle French aggrever and agriever,^[5][3] from Latin aggravō (“to make heavier, make worse”),^[5][4][6][7] the source of aggravate, of which it is a doublet.^[7] The Latin verb is formed from ad (“to”) and gravō (“to weigh down”), from gravis (“heavy”),^[6] and Etymonline takes that from Proto-Indo-European *gwere- (“heavy”).^[6] The Anglo-Norman verb is recorded from the first third of the 12th century, meaning to overburden, crush or worsen.^[8] In Old French the past participle agravet is found in the mid-11th century, already for bringing grief or trouble to a person.^[5] The spelling with a double g follows the Latin, in French from the 14th century and in English from the 15th,^[7][6] and the spelling of the stem was assimilated to grieve.^[9] The OED compares Old Occitan agreujar.^[5]

Earliest recorded meaning

To bring grief or trouble to someone, to oppress or treat unfairly: before 1325, in the Statutes of the Realm.^[5] Barnhart has "probably before 1300",^[7] Dictionary.com 1250–1300^[10] and Etymonline about 1300.^[6] The Middle English Dictionary's first quotation is from Arthour and Merlin (about 1330), for troubling or harassing people.^[2]

Semantic evolution

The French verb meant making something heavier or more severe,^[7] while in early English the word meant to disturb, trouble or harass a person or to affect a thing adversely.^[2][6] Chaucer used it for anger, distress and injury.^[11] The older meaning of making something worse, close to aggravate, lasted from before 1425 to 1591.^[5] An intransitive use, to feel grief, is recorded only in 1559.^[5] Johnson (1755) distinguished giving sorrow from a "juridical sense", to hurt someone in his right, and thought that whenever the word was used in his day it bore some allusion to forms of law.^[12] Barnhart calls it now rare except in the passive,^[7] and the Shorter Oxford except as aggrieved.^[9]

Timeline

• before 1325 – to bring grief or trouble to; to oppress, treat unfairly.^[5]
• before 1425 – to make more grave or serious (obsolete by 1591).^[5]
• 1559 – intransitive, to feel grief (obsolete).^[5]

Meanings

Verb

1. To cause someone pain, sorrow or trouble; to distress: It aggrieved the old teacher to see the school closed.^[13][3][5]
2. To treat unjustly, especially by infringing a person's legal rights; to oppress.^[13][3][5]
3. (obsolete, before 1425–1591) To make something more serious; to aggravate or exaggerate it.^[5][9][2]

Word family

• aggrievement
• aggrieved

Related words

• aggravate
• grieve
• grief
• grievance
• grave

References

1. ^ Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d Kurath, Hans; Kuhn, Sherman M.; Lewis, Robert E., eds. (1952–2001), Middle English Dictionary, Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press; online edition ed. Frances McSparran et al. (2000–2018)
3. ^ a b c d Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
4. ^ a b The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (online 2024), 5th ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
5. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
6. ^ a b c d e f Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
7. ^ a b c d e f Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
8. ^ Anglo-Norman Dictionary (AND2), Aberystwyth University, anglo-norman.net (2nd ed., 2005–)
9. ^ a b c Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
10. ^ Dictionary.com Unabridged (2016), based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, New York: Random House
11. ^ Benson, Larry D., Glossarial Concordance to Middle English (Chaucer, Gower), Johns Hopkins University, github.com/jhu-digital-manuscripts/gcme
12. ^ Johnson, Samuel (1755), A Dictionary of the English Language, London; 4th ed. 1773; Johnson's Dictionary Online, ed. Beth Rapp Young et al.
13. ^ a b Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins