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competence

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Etymology and origin of the English word competence

Confidence
Established
Formation
Borrowing
First attested
1594 Richard Carew, translation of Huarte, Examination of Mens Wits
Borrowed from
French compétence
Ultimate origin
Latin competō

Pronunciation

  • UK: /ˈkɒm.pə.təns/[1]
  • US: /ˈkɑm.pə.təns/[1]

Etymology

It is borrowed from French compétence,[2][3][4] which Merriam-Webster takes as Middle French,[5] from Latin competentia (“meeting together, agreement, symmetry”),[3][4][5] from competēns, the present participle of competō (“to fall together, coincide, be fitting”).[3][5] Cotgrave glossed the French word as "competencie, conueniencie, sufficiencie, aptnesse, fitnesse, agreeablenesse; also concurrencie, compettitorship", and the OED compares competentia and competencia.[2] The Shorter Oxford and Dictionary.com treat it instead as formed in English from competent with the suffix -ence.[6][7] Hoad dates competence and competency to the 16th century, after the adjective competent.[8]

Earliest recorded meaning

Rivalry in dignity or rank, vying: 1594, in Richard Carew's translation of Juan Huarte's Examination of Mens Wits; this sense, taken from compete "to contend", is obsolete.[2][3]

Semantic evolution

The OED groups the senses under two meanings of compete: the rare early sense of rivalry, and a larger group from the older Latin sense "to be fitting, to suffice".[2] From the second came "an adequate supply" (1600, in Shakespeare's Henry IV, Part 2), now obsolete;[2][5] then, from about 1640, came "enough money to live on in comfort", in Massinger's City Madam.[2][3] Johnson used it of easy circumstances when he wrote of people who "growled away their latter years in discontented competence".[6] The legal sense, the capacity to be heard or to act in court, is recorded from 1708 in Kersey's dictionary,[2][3] and the now usual sense, the ability to deal adequately with a subject or task, from 1790, in Burke's Reflections on the Revolution in France.[2][3] Technical senses followed: the ability of a stream to carry fragments of a given size (1877), the normal working of a heart valve (1895), the capacity of embryonic cells to respond to a stimulus (1932) and, in Chomsky's linguistics, a speaker's knowledge of a language, opposed to performance (1964).[2][9]

Timeline

  • 1594 – rivalry, vying (obsolete).[2]
  • 1600 – an adequate supply (obsolete by 1740).[2][5]
  • before 1640 – enough means to live comfortably.[2][3]
  • 1708 – legal capacity.[2][3]
  • 1738 – the condition of having enough to live on.[2]
  • 1790 – sufficient skill or capacity.[2][3]
  • 1877 – the carrying power of a stream.[2]
  • 1932 – in biology, the responsiveness of embryonic cells.[2]
  • 1964 – in linguistics, opposed to performance.[2]

Meanings

Noun

  1. The ability to do something well enough; skill or capacity: Nobody doubted her competence as a pilot.[9][5][2]
  2. (law) The state of being legally competent or qualified, as to give evidence or to try a case.[9][2]
  3. An income or property enough to live on in comfort.[9][5][2]
  4. (embryology) The ability of embryonic tissue to react to a stimulus in a way that shapes its later development.[9][2]
  5. (linguistics) In transformational grammar, a speaker's internal knowledge of a language, as opposed to performance.[9][2]
  6. (obsolete, 1600–1740) An adequate supply; sufficiency.[2][5]

Word family

  • immunocompetence
  • communicative competence

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 w x Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
  3. ^ a b c d e f g h i j Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
  4. ^ a b Klein, Ernest. A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the English Language. 2 vols. Amsterdam: Elsevier, 1966–1967.
  5. ^ a b c d e f g h Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
  6. ^ a b Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
  7. ^ Dictionary.com Unabridged (2016), based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, New York: Random House
  8. ^ Hoad, T. F., ed. (1986), The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology, Oxford: Clarendon Press
  9. ^ a b c d e f Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins

Related etymologies

Cite this entry

“Competence.” Etymologically, 26 Oct. 2026, etymologically.com/en/competence. Accessed 27 Oct. 2026.

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