essay

Pronunciation

• IPA: /ˈɛs.eɪ/, /ɛˈseɪ/^[1]

Etymology

It is borrowed from Middle French essai (“trial, attempt”),^[2][3][4] from Late Latin exagium (“a weighing, a weight”),^[2][3][5] from exigere (“to drive out; to examine, weigh”), from ex- and agere (“to drive”).^[2][3] It is a doublet of assay, and the verb is an alteration of assay after French essayer.^[2][4][6]

Earliest recorded meaning

A short literary composition: 1597, as the title of Francis Bacon's Essays, apparently taken from Montaigne's Essais (1580);^[2][3][6] a trial or attempt, the 1590s in Etymonline.^[3]

Semantic evolution

Trench notes that calling a treatise an essay was once a mark of modesty, an essay being a trial or first attempt rather than a finished work.^[7] Word Origins says the writing sense first meant a first draft.^[6] The verb, to test, is from the late 15th century,^[3][8] a sense now mostly kept by the spelling assay, and to attempt from the 1640s.^[3] A test of metals (1668) and a taste of food given to a great person (1598) are obsolete senses.^[9] In philately, an essay is a proposed design for a stamp.^[10]

Timeline

• late 15th century – the verb, to test.^[3]
• 1597 – Bacon's Essays.^[2]
• 1598 – an attempt.^[9]
• 1640s – the verb, to attempt.^[3]

Modern meaning

Noun

1. A short piece of writing on a particular subject.
2. (formal) An attempt or effort.

Verb

1. (formal) To attempt or try.

Word family

• essayer
• photo-essay
• unessayed
• essay question

Related words

• assay
• essayist
• essayistic
• exact
• examine
• agent

Usage notes

The noun is usually stressed on the first syllable, while the verb and the sense attempt may be stressed on the second.^[11][10]

References

1. ^ Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
3. ^ a b c d e f g h i Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
4. ^ a b Hoad, T. F., ed. (1986), The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology, Oxford: Clarendon Press
5. ^ Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
6. ^ a b c Cresswell, Julia (2021), Oxford Dictionary of Word Origins, 3rd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
7. ^ Trench, Richard Chenevix (1859), A Select Glossary of English Words Used Formerly in Senses Different from Their Present, London: John W. Parker
8. ^ Pearsall, Judy, ed. (1998), The New Oxford Dictionary of English, Oxford: Clarendon Press
9. ^ a b Simpson, J. A.; Weiner, E. S. C., eds. (1989), The Oxford English Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Clarendon Press
10. ^ a b Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins
11. ^ Jones, Daniel (2011), Cambridge English Pronouncing Dictionary, 18th ed., ed. Peter Roach, Jane Setter and John Esling, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press