rant

Etymology

It is borrowed from Dutch ranten (“to talk foolishly, rave”), also randen and randten, a word now obsolete in Dutch;^{[2][3][4][5][6]} the OED records it in Middle Dutch from the 14th century.^[3] The Dutch word is of uncertain or unknown origin.^[2][3][7] Etymonline compares German rantzen (“to frolic, spring about”) and the dialect word rant (“noise, uproar”),^[7] and Weekley compares Middle High German ranzen (“to spring about”), as does Collins;^[6][8] Partridge thinks it perhaps imitative.^[9] The American Heritage Dictionary calls the Dutch origin probable.^[10] Barnhart notes a parallel English verb rand (“to rave”), from the Dutch and Flemish randen, used from 1601 to 1714.^[2] The noun is formed from the verb.^[3][7]

Earliest recorded meaning

Barnhart dates the verb to 1598, in Shakespeare's Merry Wives of Windsor, where it means to be boisterously merry;^[2][3] the OED dates that play's quotation before 1616, and has the sense "to talk bombastically" first in 1602, in Ben Jonson's Poetaster.^[3] Merriam-Webster's first use for the speech sense is 1601.^[5]

Semantic evolution

Both early senses, revelry and bombast, are recorded around 1600.^[7][3] The bombastic sense was used especially of actors declaiming melodramatically,^[3] while from 1647 it also meant to rage or storm at someone;^[3] rant and rave is recorded from 1657.^[3] The modern sense, to deliver a long, angry harangue about something one dislikes, appears in 1908.^[3] The noun followed in the mid-17th century: Merriam-Webster dates it to 1649 and the OED to 1650–52, both for bombastic or angry speech and, in Scotland and northern England, for a noisy merrymaking.^[5][3][2] Johnson (1755) defined the noun as high-sounding language without dignity of thought.^[11] In Scotland the revelry sense lived on: Burns's people ranted and sang,^[4] and a rant was also a lively dance tune, from about 1700.^[6][3] The sect of the Ranters, arising about 1645, took its name from the verb, and the name was later given to the Primitive Methodists.^[7][6] In Cheshire and the south-west, dialect had a separate rant, to tear, and in Yorkshire another for a see-saw.^[12]

Timeline

• 1598 – to be boisterously merry, in Shakespeare.^[2]
• 1601 – to talk extravagantly.^[5]
• 1602 – to declaim bombastically, in Ben Jonson.^[3]
• 1607 – transitive, to utter in a bombastic way.^[3]
• 1647 – to rage or storm, often rant at.^[3]
• 1649 – noun, bombastic or extravagant speech.^[5][2]
• 1650 – noun, a riotous gathering or spree (Scottish and northern).^[3]
• 1657 – rant and rave.^[3]
• 1908 – to hold forth at length in anger or outrage.^[3]

Meanings

Verb

1. To talk loudly and angrily at length, especially in protest: He ranted about the parking fines for an hour.^[8][5][3]
2. To speak or declaim in a bombastic or melodramatic way.^[8][5][3]
3. To utter something in a loud, violent or bombastic tone.^[8][3]
4. (chiefly Scottish, archaic) To make merry noisily; to revel.^[8][5][4]

Noun

1. A long, angry or impassioned speech; a tirade.^[3][8]
2. Loud, extravagant or bombastic language.^[8][5][3]
3. (chiefly Scottish) A noisy merrymaking; a spree.^[8][3]
4. (Scottish) A lively dance or its tune.^[8][3]

Word family

• ranter
• rantingly
• outrant

Related words

• rantipole

References

1. ^ Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
3. ^ 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 Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
4. ^ a b c Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
5. ^ a b c d e f g h i Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
6. ^ a b c d Weekley, Ernest (1921), An Etymological Dictionary of Modern English, London: John Murray
7. ^ a b c d e Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
8. ^ a b c d e f g h i Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins
9. ^ Partridge, Eric (1966), Origins: A Short Etymological Dictionary of Modern English, 4th ed., London: Routledge & Kegan Paul
10. ^ The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (online 2024), 5th ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
11. ^ Johnson, Samuel (1755), A Dictionary of the English Language, London; 4th ed. 1773; Johnson's Dictionary Online, ed. Beth Rapp Young et al.
12. ^ 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)