revelry

Etymology

It is formed from English revel + -ry.^{[2][3][4][5][6]} The Merriam-Webster Unabridged instead starts from the Middle English verb revelen, with -rie.^[7] Its base revel is from Old French revel (“entertainment, revelry”), from reveler (“to be disorderly, make merry”),^[3][5] from Latin rebellō (“to rebel”),^[5][3] which makes it a doublet of rebel.^[5]

Earliest recorded meaning

Amusement, merrymaking: about 1410, in a Cambridge manuscript of Chaucer's Reeve's Tale, a text of about 1390,^[2][8][5] where leave is asked of the warden only for here myrthe and reuelrye, and the Hengwrt manuscript reads reuerye instead.^[8] It is Chaucer's only use of the word.^[9] Etymonline dates it to the early 15th century.^[3]

Semantic evolution

The word brought with it a sense that had already softened in French, where the base had moved from rebellion through tumult and disturbance to noisy mirth.^[3] The Middle English Dictionary glosses the one quotation it has as amusement, diversion and pleasure.^[8] Later use stresses noise and excess: the OED defines it as boisterous mirth, and in the plural as wild or noisy festivities, especially with drinking.^[2] Johnson (1755) called it "loose jollity; festive mirth", quoting Shakespeare's "rustick revelry" and Milton's "pomp, and feast, and revelry".^[10] Reverie, recorded earlier, is compared with it by the OED.^[2]

Timeline

• c. 1410 – merrymaking, in Chaucer's Reeve's Tale.^[2][8][5]

Meanings

Noun

1. Noisy, unrestrained merrymaking: The revelry in the square went on until dawn.^[11][7][2]
2. An act of revelling; in the plural, lively festivities, especially with drinking.^[7][2][11]

Related words

• revel
• rebel
• reverie

References

1. ^ Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
3. ^ a b c d e Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
4. ^ 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 Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
6. ^ Dictionary.com Unabridged (2016), based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, New York: Random House
7. ^ a b c Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
8. ^ 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)
9. ^ Benson, Larry D., Glossarial Concordance to Middle English (Chaucer, Gower), Johns Hopkins University, github.com/jhu-digital-manuscripts/gcme
10. ^ 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 Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins