appurtenance

Etymology

It is inherited from Middle English appurtenaunce, also apurtenaunce,^[2][3] borrowed from Anglo-Norman apurtenance (“accessory; appendage of a property or right”),^[4][5][6][7] recorded in Anglo-Norman from 1140–60.^[7] That is a variant of Old French apartenance, also apertenance,^[4][8][3][9] from apartenir (“to belong”).^[2][6][3] The Merriam-Webster Unabridged puts the vowel of the Anglo-Norman form down to the probable influence of Old French pour, also pur (“for”);^[2] Weekley to an Old French portenir, Norman purtenir, from Vulgar Latin *protineō.^[10] The OED derives the French noun from Late Latin appertinentia, which the American Heritage Dictionary gives as Vulgar Latin *appertinentia,^[4][5] from Late Latin appertineō (“to pertain to”),^[4][11][12] from ad- (“to”) and pertineō (“to belong”),^[4][11] from per (“through”) and teneō (“to hold”).^[4] Compare Italian appartenenza.^[4] The second vowel of the English word varied between a, e, o and u before the last was settled on,^[4] and it was once often left unchanged in the plural.^[4]

Earliest recorded meaning

A minor right or privilege belonging to a more important one, such as a lordship or manor: probably before 1300, in Kyng Alisaunder, according to Barnhart,^[8] and about 1300 in Etymonline.^[11] The OED, in an entry not fully revised, has it first in Langland's Piers Plowman (1377, for "subordinate part").^[4]

Semantic evolution

The sense was already legal in Anglo-Norman, where the word meant an accessory or an appendage of a property or right, and also a subsidiary building or a proportionate share.^[7] In English it spread from rights and lands to anything that belongs as a subordinate part of a whole,^[4][9] as in Hamlet: "th' appurtenance of welcome is fashion and ceremony".^[9] In the plural it came to mean equipment or gear, a use the OED finds about 1386, in Chaucer's Parson's Tale,^[4][13] and it could be used figuratively.^[4] The sense "the fact of appertaining" is a rare 19th-century addition.^[4][9] Alongside it ran the shortened purtenance, partly a variant in Anglo-Norman and partly formed from this word,^[4] also meaning the intestines of an animal.^[14]

Timeline

• before 1300 – a minor right or privilege attached to a principal one.^[8] Etymonline has about 1300,^[11] and the OED about 1378, in Piers Plowman.^[4]
• 1377 – a subordinate part, an accessory.^[4]
• c. 1386 – in the plural, apparatus, gear.^[4][13]
• 1846 – the fact of appertaining.^[4][9]

Meanings

Noun

1. (law) A minor right, interest or property attached to a principal one and passing with it: The deed conveyed the cottage and its appurtenances.^{[2][6][15][4]}
2. A secondary or subordinate part; an accessory or adjunct.^[2][6][4]
3. In the plural, equipment or gear used for a function.^[2][6][4]
4. (rare) The fact of appertaining.^[9][4]

Word family

• appurtenant

Related words

• appertain
• pertain
• purtenance
• pertinent

References

1. ^ a b 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 f Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
3. ^ a b c Klein, Ernest. A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the English Language. 2 vols. Amsterdam: Elsevier, 1966–1967.
4. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s t u v w Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
5. ^ a b The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (online 2024), 5th ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
6. ^ a b c d e Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins
7. ^ a b c Anglo-Norman Dictionary (AND2), Aberystwyth University, anglo-norman.net (2nd ed., 2005–)
8. ^ a b c Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
9. ^ a b c d e f Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
10. ^ Weekley, Ernest (1921), An Etymological Dictionary of Modern English, London: John Murray
11. ^ a b c d Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
12. ^ Hoad, T. F., ed. (1986), The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology, Oxford: Clarendon Press
13. ^ a b Benson, Larry D., Glossarial Concordance to Middle English (Chaucer, Gower), Johns Hopkins University, github.com/jhu-digital-manuscripts/gcme
14. ^ Mayhew, A. L.; Skeat, Walter W. (1888), A Concise Dictionary of Middle English from A.D. 1150 to 1580, Oxford: Clarendon Press
15. ^ Garner, Bryan A., ed. (2004), Black's Law Dictionary, 8th ed., St. Paul, Minn.: Thomson West