pew

Etymology

It is inherited from Middle English pewe, also puwe and pywe,^[2][3][4][5] borrowed from Old French puie (“parapet, balustrade, balcony, platform”), also poie and puy, recorded from the late 12th century,^[6][7][2][5] from Latin podia, the plural of podium "elevated place, balcony",^{[7][8][5][9][2]} from Ancient Greek πόδιον (pódion, “small foot, base”), a diminutive of πούς (poús, “foot”).^[9][4][2][3] The plural podia was taken as a singular.^[10] In Latin podium also meant the front balcony of a Roman theatre, where distinguished people sat.^[7] The OED notes that the French word is apparently not recorded in Anglo-Norman, and that the English word was borrowed into Medieval Latin in Britain as puwa (1423).^[6] Klein derives the French noun instead from the verb puier (“to prop, support”), from Vulgar Latin *podiō, a derivative of podium.^[3] The word is thus the same as podium and distantly related to foot.^[9][3] Johnson (1755) derived it from Dutch.^[11]

Earliest recorded meaning

In a church, a place with seating, often raised and enclosed, reserved for a particular worshipper or group of worshippers: first recorded in a version of Langland's Piers Plowman (perhaps before 1387).^[6][5][12] Etymonline glosses the early sense as a raised, bench-like seat for certain worshippers, such as ladies and important men.^[7]

Semantic evolution

According to Ayto, the word first meant a raised enclosure in a church, a court and so on, rather like a pulpit or a dock; then an enclosed place in church set aside for particular people (now called a box pew); and in the 17th century a church bench.^[9] The OED dates the sense "bench with a back, set in rows for the congregation" to 1631,^[6][7] and is unsure whether the sense "raised desk for a preacher or reader" (1479) developed from the seat sense or the other way round, comparing the use of Latin podium for a raised choir in a church (6th century).^[6] From 1558 a pew could also be a raised seat for officials, a rostrum for speakers, a stand for traders or a box in a theatre, uses the Shorter Oxford marks as obsolete by the late 17th century.^[6][12] Johnson (1755) defined it as "a seat inclosed in a church", quoting Bacon on Sir Thomas More's wife sitting "in a pew".^[11] From 1665 the pew stood for the place of the congregation as opposed to the pulpit, and later for the laity themselves.^[6][12][13] In slang pew meant simply a seat or bunk (1883),^[14] and the invitation take a pew, sit down, is recorded from 1898, in Belloc.^[6][12] The verb, to shut up in a pew, is recorded from 1609, and to furnish a church with pews from 1686.^[6][12]

Timeline

• perhaps before 1387 – a reserved, often enclosed, seat in church, in Langland's Piers Plowman.^[6][5]
• 1406 – the spelling pewe.^[5]
• 1479 – a raised desk for a preacher or reader.^[6][13]
• 1558 – a raised seat for officials; a rostrum.^[6][13]
• 1607–1673 – figuratively, an allotted place (obsolete).^[6]
• 1609 – verb, to shut up in a pew.^[6]
• 1631 – a bench with a back, in rows for the congregation.^[6][7]
• 1665 – the place of the congregation, as opposed to the pulpit.^[6]
• 1686 – verb, to furnish with pews.^[6]
• 1883 – slang, a seat.^[14]
• 1898 – take a pew, sit down.^[6]

Meanings

Noun

1. One of the long benches with backs set in rows in a church to seat the congregation: They sat in the front pew.^[15][6][12]
2. An enclosed compartment in a church reserved for a family or other small group; a box pew.^[15][4][6]
3. (informal, chiefly British) A seat, especially in take a pew, sit down.^[15][6][12]
4. The congregation or the laity, as opposed to the clergy or the pulpit.^[12][6]
5. (obsolete) A raised standing place or desk in a church for a preacher or reader.^[12][6]
6. (obsolete, 1607–1673) An allotted place or station.^[6][12]

Verb

1. To furnish a church with pews.^[4][12][6]
2. To shut someone in, or as if in, a pew.^[4][12][6]

Word family

• pewage
• pewholder

Related words

• podium
• foot

Usage notes

Several minor words have the same spelling: in Scots, pew is a breath, a thin stream of air or smoke, or the slightest amount of something, an imitative word,^{[6][12][4][16]} and in Newfoundland a pew is a long-handled pronged tool for moving fish from the boat to the wharf, from French pieu (“stake”).^[6][12][4]

References

1. ^ a b Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d Hoad, T. F., ed. (1986), The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology, Oxford: Clarendon Press
3. ^ a b c d Klein, Ernest. A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the English Language. 2 vols. Amsterdam: Elsevier, 1966–1967.
4. ^ a b c d e f g Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
5. ^ a b c d e f Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
6. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s t u v w x y z 27 28 Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
7. ^ a b c d e f Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
8. ^ The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (online 2024), 5th ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
9. ^ a b c d Ayto, John (2005), Word Origins: The Secret Histories of English Words from A to Z, 2nd ed., London: A & C Black
10. ^ Dictionary.com Unabridged (2016), based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, New York: Random House
11. ^ 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.
12. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
13. ^ a b c Kay, Christian; Roberts, Jane; Samuels, Michael; Wotherspoon, Irené, eds. (2009), Historical Thesaurus of the Oxford English Dictionary, Oxford: Oxford University Press; online edition (2024)
14. ^ a b Green, Jonathon (2010), Green's Dictionary of Slang, London: Chambers; digital ed. 2016–, https://greensdictofslang.com
15. ^ a b c Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins
16. ^ Wright, Joseph, ed. (1898–1905), The English Dialect Dictionary, 6 vols., Oxford: Henry Frowde; via EDD Online 4.0, University of Innsbruck (CC BY 4.0)