control

Pronunciation

• IPA: UK /kənˈtrəʊl/, US /kənˈtroʊl/^[1]

Etymology

It is inherited from Middle English countrollen (“to check, verify accounts”),^[2][3][4] borrowed from Anglo-Norman contreroller (“to keep a copy of a roll of accounts”),^[5][6][7] from Medieval Latin contrārotulāre (“to check by a duplicate register”),^[7][6] from contrārotulus (“copy of a roll”),^[7][5] from Latin contrā (“against”) and rotulus (“roll”), a diminutive of rota (“wheel”).^[2][7] It comes from the medieval practice of checking accounts against a duplicate register.^[2][5][8] The noun is partly from the verb and partly borrowed from Middle French contrôle.^[3][6]

Earliest recorded meaning

To check or verify payments and accounts: 1422, in the Rolls of Parliament.^[3][2] Etymonline quotes an Anglo-French contrerollour in the household ordinances of Edward II, about 1310.^[2]

Semantic evolution

The sense “to direct, dominate” is from 1451.^[3][2] The noun is from 1590, “restraint”, in Shakespeare's Comedy of Errors,^[3] or the 1580s.^[2] A control became a standard of comparison in experiments by 1857, probably after German Controleversuche,^[2] and the OED has it from 1875.^[9] The levers and instruments that steer a machine or aircraft were controls from 1908.^[9] Later compounds include control room (1897), control tower (1920), control group (1952) and control freak (1969).^[2] Everything under control is recorded from 1933.^[9] Controller “one who checks expenditure” dates from before 1387,^[3] and comptroller is a variant spelling of it.^[10]

Timeline

• c. 1310 – Anglo-French contrerollour.^[2]
• before 1387 – controller.^[3]
• 1422 – verb, to check accounts.^[3]
• 1451 – to direct, dominate.^[3]
• 1590 – noun, restraint (Shakespeare).^[3]
• 1857 – a standard in experiments.^[2]
• 1908 – the controls of a machine.^[9]
• 1920 – control tower.^[2]
• 1969 – control freak.^[2]

Modern meaning

Verb

1. To have power over; to direct or govern.
2. To hold back; to restrain.
3. To check or verify, as an experiment against a standard, or an account against a duplicate register.

Noun

1. The power to direct or manage.
2. A means of restraint; a curb.
3. A device or set of instruments for operating a machine or vehicle.
4. A standard of comparison for checking the results of an experiment.

Word family

• controllability
• controllable
• controlment
• controllably
• controlless
• controllingly

Related words

• roll
• contra
• comptroller
• rotate
• rota

References

1. ^ 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 g h i j k l m Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
3. ^ a b c d e f g h i j Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
4. ^ Merriam-Webster's Collegiate Dictionary (2003), 11th ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
5. ^ a b c Soanes, Catherine; Stevenson, Angus, eds. (2004), Concise Oxford English Dictionary, 11th ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
6. ^ a b c Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
7. ^ a b c d The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (2000), 4th ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin
8. ^ Cresswell, Julia (2021), Oxford Dictionary of Word Origins, 3rd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
9. ^ a b c d Simpson, J. A.; Weiner, E. S. C., eds. (1989), The Oxford English Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Clarendon Press
10. ^ Hoad, T. F., ed. (1986), The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology, Oxford: Clarendon Press