relegation

Etymology

It is inherited from Middle English relegacioun, also religacioun,^[2] partly borrowed from Middle French relegacion, recorded in French from before 1374, and partly directly borrowed from Latin relēgātiō (“banishment”),^[3][2][4][5] a term of Roman law and later of church law.^[6] The Latin noun is formed on relēgātus, the past participle of relēgō (“to send away, remove, banish”),^[3][4][7][6] from re- (“back”) and lēgō (“to send as a deputy, send with a commission”).^[6][8][9] In later use the English noun was also felt as relegate with the suffix -ion.^[3] relegació and relegazione are recorded from the 14th century.^[3]

Earliest recorded meaning

Banishment or exile: about 1425, in John Lydgate's Troy Book.^[2][3] Etymonline dates the word only from the 1580s.^[6]

Semantic evolution

In Roman history relegation was a milder form of banishment: the person was sent to a place at a distance from Rome, often for a limited time, without losing property or civil rights.^[3][5][7] Johnson (1755) defined it simply as exile or judicial banishment.^[10] From 1708 it could mean sending a person, and in extended use a thing, away to some place,^[3][11] following the verb, which from 1790 meant placing someone in an inferior position.^[6][12] In the 19th century it also meant referring a matter to someone else to deal with (1844), a sense now rare.^[3][5] The sense most common today, in sport, is the demotion of a team to a lower division of a league, first recorded in 1894 in The Times.^[3][11] In football it is decided by the team's final position in the league table.^[3]

Timeline

• c. 1425 – banishment, exile, in Lydgate's Troy Book.^[2][3]
• 1580s – first date in Etymonline.^[6]
• 1708 – sending a person or thing away to a place.^[3]
• 1844 – referring a matter to another person or body.^[3]
• 1894 – demotion of a team to a lower division.^[3]

Meanings

Noun

1. The demotion of a sports team to a lower division of a league, especially in football: The club escaped relegation on the last day of the season.^[3][5]
2. The act of relegating or the state of being relegated; removal to a less important place or position.^[7][3]
3. The handing over of a matter to another person or body to deal with.^[7][5][3]
4. Banishment or exile; in Roman law, a mild form of banishment that did not take away property or civil rights.^[7][3][10]

Related words

• relegate
• legate
• delegate
• legation

References

1. ^ a b Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d 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 e f g h i j k l m n o p q r Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
4. ^ a b Klein, Ernest. A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the English Language. 2 vols. Amsterdam: Elsevier, 1966–1967.
5. ^ a b c d e Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
6. ^ a b c d e f Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
7. ^ a b c d e Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
8. ^ Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
9. ^ The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (online 2024), 5th ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
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. ^ a b Kay, Christian; Roberts, Jane; Samuels, Michael; Wotherspoon, Irené, eds. (2009), Historical Thesaurus of the Oxford English Dictionary, Oxford: Oxford University Press; online edition (2024)
12. ^ Barnhart, Robert K., ed. (1995), The Barnhart Concise Dictionary of Etymology, New York: HarperCollins