Etymologically
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gradual

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Pronunciation

  • US: /ˈɡɹæd͡ʒuəl/, /ˈɡɹæd͡ʒəl/[1]

Etymology

It is inherited from Middle English gradual,[2][3] borrowed from Medieval Latin graduālis (“having steps, by steps”),[4][5][6][7][3] from Latin gradus (“a step, a degree”),[4][5][6][8] from Proto-Indo-European *ghredh- (“to walk, go”).[5] The noun, the chant and the choir book, is graduāle, the neuter of the adjective used as a noun,[4][3][7][8] which Merriam-Webster takes as an alteration of Late Latin gradāle;[9] the Middle English Dictionary gives both forms as its source.[2] It was so called because the chant was sung at the steps of the altar.[4][3][8][9] The OED compares French graduel, from which Johnson derived the adjective.[4][10] The Latin noun is also the source of grade, gradation, gradient, graduate and retrograde.[11]

Earliest recorded meaning

Having steps or ridges: in a Middle English translation of Guy de Chauliac's surgery, probably from before 1425, the graduale roundenez are the ridged bulges at the lower end of the upper arm bone, where it joins the bones of the forearm.[2][6][5]

Semantic evolution

The Oxford Dictionary of English gives "arranged in degrees" as the adjective's original sense;[12] the OED records it from about 1541 to 1712, and Etymonline from the 1540s.[4][5] In the 17th century the word was also used of difference in degree, in gradual difference (1651–58), and in music of the degrees of the scale (1665, 1694), uses that died out.[4] Merriam-Webster dates its own first sense, arranged in grades or degrees, to 1658.[9] The modern sense, taking place by degrees, advancing step by step, appears in 1692 in Locke,[4][6][5] and the OED groups with it the sense of a slope that is gentle, not steep.[4] Johnson (1755) defined it as proceeding by degrees, advancing step by step.[10] From 1739 poets also applied it to things that taper or slope, or move or change little by little.[4] The noun followed the church use: a book of the sung parts of the Mass is recorded in Middle English from 1447,[2][7] the chant sung between the Epistle and the Gospel from 1563,[4] and Dryden used it once for the steps of an altar (1693).[4] The gradual psalms are the fifteen psalms (120–134) headed "Song of Degrees" in the King James Bible.[4]

Timeline

  • probably before 1425 – having steps or ridges, in surgery.[2][6]
  • 1447 – noun, a service book of the sung parts of the Mass.[2]
  • c. 1541 – arranged in degrees (obsolete by 1712).[4][5]
  • 1563 – noun, the antiphon sung between the Epistle and the Gospel.[4]
  • 1651 – of or relating to degree, in gradual difference (obsolete).[4]
  • 1656 – the gradual psalms.[4]
  • 1692 – taking place by degrees, slowly progressive; of a slope, gentle.[4][6][5]
  • 1739 – in poetry, tapering, or moving or changing little by little.[4]

Meanings

Adjective

  1. Happening or developing in small stages over a period of time, rather than suddenly: a gradual rise in prices.[13][9][4]
  2. Of a slope: gentle, not steep or abrupt.[13][4]
  3. (obsolete, 1541–1712) Arranged in, or admitting of, degrees.[4][7]

Noun

  1. In the Mass, an antiphon or group of antiphons, usually from the Psalms, sung or said between the epistle and the gospel.[13][9][4]
  2. A book containing these and the other sung parts of the Mass.[13][9][4][2]

Word family

  • gradually
  • gradualness
  • gradualism
  • ungradual

References

  1. ^ Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
  2. ^ a b c d e f g 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)
  3. ^ a b c d The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (online 2024), 5th ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
  4. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s t u v w x Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
  5. ^ a b c d e f g h Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
  6. ^ a b c d e f Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
  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. ^ a b c Klein, Ernest. A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the English Language. 2 vols. Amsterdam: Elsevier, 1966–1967.
  9. ^ a b c d e f Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
  10. ^ 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.
  11. ^ Ayto, John (2005), Word Origins: The Secret Histories of English Words from A to Z, 2nd ed., London: A & C Black
  12. ^ Stevenson, Angus, ed. (2010), Oxford Dictionary of English, 3rd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
  13. ^ a b c d Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins