corrective

Etymology

It is borrowed from Middle French correctif (“corrective”),^[2][3][4][5] from Medieval Latin corrēctīvus,^[4][6] formed from corrēctus (“set right”), the past participle of corrigō (“to put straight, reform”), with the suffix -īvus.^[4][3][5] The Oxford dictionaries allow a direct borrowing of the Late Latin adjective as well.^[7][8] It belongs with correct.^[3][5]

Earliest recorded meaning

Used in corrective justice, a rendering of Aristotle's term for the justice that rights wrongs: 1531, in Thomas Elyot's Boke Named the Gouernour.^[2][4] Etymonline dates the adjective to the 1530s.^[3]

Semantic evolution

In 1541 Elyot also used it in medicine, of something that counteracts a harmful effect or restores health,^[2] and the general sense "tending to set right what is faulty" is recorded from 1603, in Florio's Montaigne.^[2] The noun followed in the 1610s: first something that neutralizes what is harmful (Jonson's Alchemist, 1612), then from 1768 anything that removes or counteracts an evil; something that corrects an error is recorded from 1854.^[2][3] Johnson (1755) gave both the adjective and the noun, with an example of mulberries correcting bile.^[9] An obsolete noun sense, a correction made to remove inaccuracy, was used from before 1676 to 1769.^[2][4]

Timeline

• 1531 – corrective justice, in Elyot.^[2][4]
• 1541 – counteracting something harmful; restoring to health.^[2]
• 1603 – tending to correct what is wrong or faulty.^[2]
• 1612 – noun, something that counteracts what is harmful.^[2][3]
• before 1676 – noun, a correction (obsolete by 1769).^[2]
• 1768 – noun, something that sets right a wrong or an evil.^[2]
• 1854 – noun, something that corrects an error.^[2]

Meanings

Adjective

1. Meant to correct or set right what is faulty or wrong: corrective surgery, corrective lenses.^[4][10][2]
2. Able to counteract something harmful or restore a normal condition: a course of corrective exercises.^[4][2]
3. Concerning the punishment and reform of offenders; correctional.^[4]

Noun

1. Something that corrects or counteracts; a remedy: His article was a useful corrective to the general optimism.^[4][10][2]

Word family

• correctively

Related words

• correct
• correction
• correctional
• incorrigible

References

1. ^ 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 Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
3. ^ a b c d e f Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
4. ^ a b c d e f g h i j Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
5. ^ a b c Klein, Ernest. A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the English Language. 2 vols. Amsterdam: Elsevier, 1966–1967.
6. ^ Dictionary.com Unabridged (2016), based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, New York: Random House
7. ^ Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
8. ^ Stevenson, Angus, ed. (2010), Oxford Dictionary of English, 3rd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
9. ^ Johnson, Samuel (1755), A Dictionary of the English Language, London; 4th ed. 1773; Johnson's Dictionary Online, ed. Beth Rapp Young et al.
10. ^ a b Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins