equitable

Etymology

It is borrowed from French équitable,^[2][3][4][5] in Merriam-Webster's account from Middle French equitable,^[6] from équité (“equity”) and the suffix -able.^[2][6][7] The Shorter Oxford notes that the suffix has an active meaning here, as in charitable.^[7] The French noun, the source of equity, is from Latin aequitās (“equality, fairness”), from aequus (“even, just, equal”).^[2][3] Etymonline dates the French adjective to the 16th century.^[2]

Earliest recorded meaning

Fair and just: Merriam-Webster's first date is 1598,^[6] and the Shorter Oxford and the Oxford Dictionary of English place the word in the mid 16th century.^[7][8] The OED's first quotation is from 1646, in Sir Thomas Browne's Pseudodoxia Epidemica, and Etymonline also dates it to the 1640s.^[3][2]

Semantic evolution

At first used of actions, arrangements and decisions that were fair, the word was applied from 1682 to people guided by fairness, a sense the OED now calls rare.^[3] Johnson (1755) gave both, "just" and "loving justice; impartial".^[9] In law, from before 1720, it came to mean belonging to the body of rules called equity, as opposed to common law, so that an equitable right or claim is one valid in equity.^[3][7][4]

Timeline

• 1598 – fair, just.^[6] The OED's first quotation is from 1646.^[3]
• 1682 – of persons, impartial, guided by fairness.^[3]
• before 1720 – in law, relating to or valid in equity.^[3]

Meanings

Adjective

1. Fair and impartial; just to everyone concerned: an equitable division of the profits.^[4][6][3]
2. (law) Relating to, or valid in, equity, as distinct from common law or statute law.^[4][6][3]
3. Of a person, guided by fairness; unbiased (now rare).^[3][9]

Word family

• equitableness
• equitably
• equitability
• inequitable
• unequitable

Related words

• equity
• equal
• equable
• iniquity
• adequate

References

1. ^ Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
3. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
4. ^ a b c d Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins
5. ^ Klein, Ernest. A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the English Language. 2 vols. Amsterdam: Elsevier, 1966–1967.
6. ^ a b c d e f Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
7. ^ a b c d 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. ^ a b Johnson, Samuel (1755), A Dictionary of the English Language, London; 4th ed. 1773; Johnson's Dictionary Online, ed. Beth Rapp Young et al.