coherence

Etymology

It is borrowed from Middle French cohérence, a French word of the 16th century,^[2][3][4] and also directly borrowed from Latin cohaerentia (“a sticking together, coherence”).^[4][5][6] The Latin noun is formed from cohaerēns, the present participle of cohaereō (“to stick together”),^[2][3][4] which is made up of com- (“together”) and haereō (“to stick, adhere”).^[3] Dictionary.com takes the English word as coherent with the suffix -ence instead.^[7]

Earliest recorded meaning

The first record, about 1580 in the play Tragedy of Richard II, uses it figuratively of a close association between people or things that is not physical.^[2][4] Etymonline dates the word to the 1580s, in the senses "suitable connection, consistency" in a narrative or argument and, more literally, "the sticking of one thing to another".^[3]

Semantic evolution

The logical sense, connection or consistency between ideas, is recorded from 1588 in Fraunce's Lawiers Logike,^[2] and in the 17th century the word was applied to discourse in which no part contradicts the rest, the sense Johnson defined.^[2] The literal sense of physical sticking together, which the OED records from Cawdrey's word list of 1604,^[2] survives, but Collins treats it as only another word for cohesion.^[8] Webster (1828) still put the physical sense first.^[9] Two 16th-century senses died out: "agreement" (1597–1680) and "context", the parts of a text around a passage (1583–1737).^[2][5] In the 20th century the word took on technical senses: in philosophy the coherence theory of truth (1906),^[2][5] and in physics the property of waves of being coherent (1926).^[2][10]

Timeline

• c. 1580 – a close connection or association that is not physical.^[2][4] Dictionary.com dates the word to 1570–80.^[7]
• 1583 – the context of a passage (obsolete by 1737).^[2]
• 1588 – logical connection, consistency.^[2]
• 1597 – agreement (obsolete by 1680).^[2]
• 1604 – the act or fact of sticking together; cohesion.^[2]
• before 1623 – consistency of reasoning, a harmonious connection of the parts of a discourse.^[2]
• 1906 – in philosophy, the theory that truth consists in the coherence of propositions.^[2]
• 1926 – in physics, the property of being coherent.^[2]

Meanings

Noun

1. The quality of forming a logical, orderly and consistent whole; clear connection between parts: The second draft had far more coherence than the first.^[8][10][4]
2. Cohesion; the act or state of sticking together.^[8][2][5]
3. The integration of social and cultural elements on the basis of a consistent set of values.^[4]
4. (physics) The property of waves of being coherent.^[10][5][2]
5. (philosophy) coherence theory: the theory that truth consists in, or is tested by, the agreement of a proposition with a coherent system of propositions.^[5][2]
6. (obsolete, 1583–1737) The context of a passage.^[2][5]
7. (obsolete, 1597–1680) Agreement.^[2][5]

Related words

• cohesion
• coherent
• cohere
• adhere
• hesitation

References

1. ^ a b 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 Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
3. ^ a b c d Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
4. ^ a b c d e f g Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
5. ^ a b c d e f g h Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
6. ^ Klein, Ernest. A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the English Language. 2 vols. Amsterdam: Elsevier, 1966–1967.
7. ^ a b Dictionary.com Unabridged (2016), based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, New York: Random House
8. ^ a b c Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins
9. ^ Webster, Noah (1828), An American Dictionary of the English Language, New York: S. Converse
10. ^ a b c The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (online 2024), 5th ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt