recurrence

Etymology

It is formed from English recurrent + -ence,^[2][3][4][5] though Merriam-Webster and Dictionary.com take it from recur with the same suffix.^[6][7][8] The OED notes that the adjective is first recorded in a general sense slightly later than the noun, and compares Italian recorrenza, recorded in 1611 in Florio, and the slightly earlier English nouns recurrency and recursion.^[2] Recurrent is from Latin recurrēns, the present participle of recurrō (“to run back, return; to go back in thought; to revert”),^[2][4] from re- (“back, again”) and currō (“to run”), from Proto-Indo-European *kers- (“to run”).^[4]

Earliest recorded meaning

An instance of recurring, a further occurrence: 1626, in Francis Bacon's Sylva Sylvarum.^[2] Etymonline dates the word to the 1640s,^[4] Dictionary.com to 1640–50,^[7] and the Shorter Oxford to the mid 17th century.^[3]

Semantic evolution

The general sense of frequent or periodic return followed in 1641.^[2] In the late 17th century the word also meant recourse or resort to something for help or explanation, a sense used until the mid 19th century;^[2][3] Merriam-Webster still lists it.^[6] From 1751, in Johnson's Rambler, it was used for going back to something in thought, memory or speech, a sense now rare.^[2][3] Medicine adopted it in 1772 for the return of symptoms or of a disease after a remission,^[2] and biology in 1862, in Huxley, for the reappearance of an ancestral type in bred animals and plants.^[2]

Timeline

• 1626 – an instance of recurring.^[2] Etymonline dates the noun to the 1640s.^[4]
• 1641 – frequent or periodic occurrence.^[2]
• 1697 – recourse, resort (obsolete by 1845).^[2]
• 1751 – a going back to something in thought or speech.^[2]
• 1772 – in medicine, the return of a disease or its symptoms.^[2]
• 1789 – a return to a former state or activity.^[2]
• 1862 – in biology, reversion to an ancestral type.^[2]

Meanings

Noun

1. An instance of recurring; a further occurrence: Engineers took steps to prevent a recurrence of the flooding.^[6][2][3]
2. The fact of recurring; periodic or frequent return; reappearance.^[6][2]
3. In medicine, the return of a disease or its symptoms after a period of remission.^[2]
4. A return to a former state or activity.^[2]
5. The act of going back to something in thought, memory or speech (now rare).^[2][3]
6. (obsolete, 1697–1845) Recourse or resort to something.^[2][3][6]

Related words

• recur
• recurrent
• recursive
• recursion
• occurrence
• current
• incur

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 Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
3. ^ a b c d e f g Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
4. ^ a b c d e Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
5. ^ Klein, Ernest. A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the English Language. 2 vols. Amsterdam: Elsevier, 1966–1967.
6. ^ a b c d e Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
7. ^ a b Dictionary.com Unabridged (2016), based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, New York: Random House
8. ^ Gove, Philip Babcock, ed. (1961), Webster's Third New International Dictionary of the English Language, Unabridged, Springfield, Mass.: G. & C. Merriam