erect

Etymology

The adjective is borrowed from Latin ērēctus (“upright, raised, lofty”),^{[2][3][4][5][6]} the past participle of ērigō (“to raise, set up”),^[2][3][7][8] formed from ē- (“out, up”), a form of ex- used before r,^[5][4] and regō (“to direct, keep straight, guide”).^[3][7][2][9] Etymonline traces the Latin verb to Proto-Indo-European *reg- (“to move in a straight line”),^[3] and the American Heritage Dictionary refers it to the same root.^[4] Besides "upright", the Latin participle could mean "elevated", "alert, eager", "resolute" and "arrogant".^[3] The verb, erecten,^[10][11] is according to Etymonline either a back-formation from the adjective or taken directly from the Latin participle;^[3] Barnhart thinks both played a part,^[5] while the OED derives it from the Latin participial stem ērēct-.^[2] The word belongs to the same Latin family as regent, region and direct,^[7][6] and Barnhart refers the root to right.^[5]

Earliest recorded meaning

Upright, not bending forward or down: about 1386, in Chaucer's Man of Law's Tale,^[2][5] where a tree's shadow is compared with the length of a body standing erect.^[10] Hoad notes that the adjective is rare before the 16th century.^[12]

Semantic evolution

The verb first meant to direct upwards or to set upright,^[5][10] and soon also to set up or build (1417, in Barnhart).^[5] From the 15th to the 18th century it was also used for raising someone to a dignity or office and for lifting up the eyes or hands, while rousing the mind is a 16th- to 18th-century use; the Shorter Oxford marks these senses obsolete.^[8][2] The adjective likewise had a figurative sense, of a mind lifted up and alert (1544–1757), and was used of an unabashed face (1618–1796).^[2] Johnson (1755) defined it as "upright; not leaning; not prone".^[13] The building sense spread to founding institutions, raising an army, drawing a perpendicular in geometry and casting a horoscope in astrology.^[8] Specialised uses followed in botany and heraldry (1688),^[2] in optics, of an image that is not inverted (1855),^[2][8] and in physiology: from 1626, in Bacon, the verb was used of setting up a part of the body or pricking up the ears, and later of making an organ rigid,^[2] and the adjective is recorded of the penis, nipples or clitoris from 1897.^[2]

Timeline

• c. 1386 – adjective, upright, in Chaucer.^[2][5]
• c. 1408 – verb, to direct upward (Barnhart's probable date).^[5]
• 1417 – verb, to set up, build.^[2][5]
• c. 1425 – verb, to set upright, in Lydgate's Troy Book.^[10]
• 1544 – adjective, of the mind, alert, attentive (obsolete by 1757).^[2]
• 1557 – to raise the body to an upright position.^[2]
• 1626 – to set upright a part of the body; to prick up the ears.^[2]
• 1688 – in botany and heraldry.^[2]
• 1855 – in optics, to turn an inverted image upright.^[2]
• 1897 – of the penis, nipples or clitoris, enlarged and rigid.^[2]

Meanings

Adjective

1. Standing straight up; upright, not bent or leaning: The old soldier still walked erect.^[14][11][2]
2. Of hair, a tail and the like, standing up or out from the body; bristling.^[11][2]
3. Of an optical image, having the same orientation as the object; not inverted.^[14][11][8]
4. Of the penis, clitoris or nipples, firm and swollen with blood, especially through sexual arousal.^[14][2]
5. Of plant parts, growing vertically rather than spreading.^[14][11]

Verb

1. To build or construct something, such as a building, wall or bridge: The villagers erected a new hall.^[14][11][8]
2. To set up in an upright position: to erect a flagpole.^[14][11]
3. To set up or establish an institution, office or system.^[8][11]
4. In geometry, to draw a line perpendicular to another, or a figure on a given base.^[8]
5. (obsolete) To raise in rank or dignity; to elevate to an office.^[2][8]

Word family

• erectable
• erectly
• erectness
• suberect
• unerect
• semierect
• erector
• nonerecting

Related words

• erectile
• erection
• regent
• region
• direct
• right
• rector

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 q r s t u v w 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 The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (online 2024), 5th ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
5. ^ a b c d e f g h i j Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
6. ^ a b Klein, Ernest. A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the English Language. 2 vols. Amsterdam: Elsevier, 1966–1967.
7. ^ a b c Ayto, John (2005), Word Origins: The Secret Histories of English Words from A to Z, 2nd ed., London: A & C Black
8. ^ a b c d e f g h i Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
9. ^ Skeat, Walter W. (1911), A Concise Etymological Dictionary of the English Language, new ed., Oxford: Clarendon Press
10. ^ a b c d Kurath, Hans; Kuhn, Sherman M.; Lewis, Robert E., eds. (1952–2001), Middle English Dictionary, Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press; online edition ed. Frances McSparran et al. (2000–2018)
11. ^ a b c d e f g h Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
12. ^ Hoad, T. F., ed. (1986), The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology, Oxford: Clarendon Press
13. ^ Johnson, Samuel (1755), A Dictionary of the English Language, London; 4th ed. 1773; Johnson's Dictionary Online, ed. Beth Rapp Young et al.
14. ^ a b c d e f Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins