celerity

Etymology

It is inherited from Middle English celerite,^[2][3][4] borrowed from Middle French célérité,^[2][5][3] earlier Old French celeritee,^[6][7] from Latin celeritās (“swiftness”),^[2][6][8] from celer (“swift”) and -itās.^[3][4] The Anglo-Norman form is recorded from 1390–1412,^[9] and Etymonline dates the Old French one to the 14th century.^[6] De Vaan reconstructs the adjective as Proto-Indo-European *kel-i- (“speeding”).^[10] Barnhart calls it probably cognate with Ancient Greek κέλλω (kéllō, “to drive on”) and κέλης (kélēs, “racehorse, racing boat”),^[5][10] and Merriam-Webster Unabridged and Klein add Gothic 𐌷𐌰𐌻𐌳𐌰𐌽 (haldan, “to tend animals”),^[3][11] which Klein connects with hold.^[11] Etymonline also compares Lithuanian šuoliai (“a gallop”) and Old High German scelo (“stallion”).^[6]

Earliest recorded meaning

Swiftness, speed: 1483, in a letter of King Richard III.^[2] Barnhart has the same year,^[5] and Merriam-Webster Unabridged says the 15th century.^[3]

Semantic evolution

The word first meant speed in general.^[2] In 18th-century science it was also a particular rate of speed, from Berkeley's Analyst (1734) to 1794, until velocity replaced it;^[2][12] Johnson (1755) still glossed it "swiftness; speed; velocity", with quotations on moving bodies and the blood beside Shakespeare's "In motion with no less celerity / Than that of thought".^[13] The OED says it is now used chiefly of living beings and their actions,^[2] Merriam-Webster Unabridged adds promptness to the sense,^[3] and the Concise Oxford labels it archaic or literary.^[14]

Timeline

• 1483 – swiftness, speed.^[2][5]
• 1734 – a particular rate of speed (obsolete by 1794).^[2]

Meanings

Noun

1. Swiftness of movement or action; speed: The clerk sorted the mail with astonishing celerity.^[8][3][7][2]
2. Promptness, alacrity.^[3]
3. (obsolete, 1734–94) A particular rate of speed; velocity.^[2][12]

Related words

• accelerate
• decelerate
• hold

References

1. ^ a b Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
3. ^ a b c d e f g h Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
4. ^ a b Dictionary.com Unabridged (2016), based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, New York: Random House
5. ^ a b c d Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
6. ^ a b c d Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
7. ^ a b Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins
8. ^ a b The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (online 2024), 5th ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
9. ^ Anglo-Norman Dictionary (AND2), Aberystwyth University, anglo-norman.net (2nd ed., 2005–)
10. ^ a b de Vaan, Michiel (2008), Etymological Dictionary of Latin and the other Italic Languages, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 7, Leiden; Boston: Brill
11. ^ a b Klein, Ernest. A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the English Language. 2 vols. Amsterdam: Elsevier, 1966–1967.
12. ^ a b Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
13. ^ Johnson, Samuel (1755), A Dictionary of the English Language, London; 4th ed. 1773; Johnson's Dictionary Online, ed. Beth Rapp Young et al.
14. ^ Soanes, Catherine; Stevenson, Angus, eds. (2004), Concise Oxford English Dictionary, 11th ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press