alienate

Etymology

It is borrowed from Latin aliēnātus, the past participle of aliēnō (“to make another's, transfer; to estrange”),^[2][3][4][5] from aliēnus (“of or belonging to another person or place”), the source of alien,^[3][6][7] from alius (“another, other”),^[3][4] from Proto-Indo-European *al- (“beyond”).^[3] The word first came in as an adjective, alienat,^[6] from the participle,^[2][4] and the verb is taken from the participial stem aliēnāt- with the suffix -ate.^[2][8] Barnhart suggests instead that the verb is a use of the adjective, and that the property sense may be a back-formation from alienation or owes something to Middle French aliéner.^[4] Middle English had earlier made a simple verb, alienen, from Old French aliener and Latin,^[3][9] which the longer verb eventually replaced.^[7]

Earliest recorded meaning

The adjective, of a person or the mind, "deranged": about 1425, in a translation of Guy de Chauliac.^[2] Barnhart has the adjective "estranged" already before 1420, in Lydgate's Troy Book.^[4] The verb, "to transfer property to a new owner", first appears about 1475 in the OED, in a translation of Higden's Polychronicon.^[2]

Semantic evolution

The Latin verb already meant to transfer property, to lose possession, to make mad and to estrange.^[2] The verb alienen had covered the same ground, being used in theology for estrangement from God from the mid-14th century and in law from about 1400.^[3][9] The legal sense came first in the longer verb, and the sense of estranging followed in 1531, in Elyot's Gouernour.^[2] Older dictionaries date both later: Merriam-Webster Unabridged has 1509 for the legal sense, Etymonline the 1510s and the 1540s, and Barnhart 1573 and 1548.^[6][3][4] From 1534 it also meant to turn away or divert, and for a time to alter.^[2] To alienate a person's affections is recorded from 1572, and in American law from 1790 for drawing a spouse's affection away.^[2] Johnson (1755) lists both main senses, transferring property and withdrawing the heart, and quotes Hooker for the second.^[10] The adjective died out by 1881.^[2] The noun, an alien or stranger, lasted from 1497 to 1615.^[2]

Timeline

• c. 1425 – adjective, deranged (obsolete by 1545).^[2]
• c. 1475 – verb, to transfer ownership of property.^[2]
• 1497 – noun, an alien, a stranger (obsolete by 1615).^[2]
• before 1500 – adjective, estranged (obsolete by 1881).^[2]
• 1531 – to make hostile or unsympathetic; to estrange.^[2]
• 1533 – adjective, foreign in nature (obsolete by 1787).^[2]
• 1534 – to turn away, divert; also to alter (the latter obsolete by 1664).^[2]
• 1572 – to alienate a person's affections.^[2]
• 1790 – the same phrase as a term of American law.^[2]

Meanings

Verb

1. To cause someone to become unfriendly or hostile, or to feel they do not belong; to estrange: The new rules alienated many longtime members.^[11][6][2]
2. (law) To transfer the ownership of property or a right to another.^[11][6][2]
3. To turn away or divert; to separate from something.^[11][2]

Adjective

1. (obsolete, before 1500–1881) Estranged; hostile or indifferent.^[2][6][8]
2. (obsolete, 1533–1787) Foreign in nature or character.^[2][8]

Noun

1. (obsolete, 1497–1615) An alien or stranger.^[2][8]

Word family

• alienator
• realienate

Related words

• alien
• alienation
• alienable
• inalienable
• alienist
• else

References

1. ^ Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s t u v w x y z Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
3. ^ a b c d e f g Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
4. ^ a b c d e f Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
5. ^ Klein, Ernest. A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the English Language. 2 vols. Amsterdam: Elsevier, 1966–1967.
6. ^ a b c d e f Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
7. ^ a b Ayto, John (2005), Word Origins: The Secret Histories of English Words from A to Z, 2nd ed., London: A & C Black
8. ^ a b c d Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
9. ^ a b 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)
10. ^ Johnson, Samuel (1755), A Dictionary of the English Language, London; 4th ed. 1773; Johnson's Dictionary Online, ed. Beth Rapp Young et al.
11. ^ a b c Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins