Etymologically
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severity

This is the current revision of this entry, as edited by bogdan on 24 October 2026 at 18:41. This address is a permanent link to this version.
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Pronunciation

  • UK: /sɪˈvɛɹ.ɪ.ti/[1]
  • US: /səˈvɛɹ.ə.ti/[1]

Etymology

It is borrowed from Middle French severité, modern sévérité, recorded in Anglo-Norman from about 1240,[2][3][4][5] or directly Latin sevēritās (“seriousness, strictness, sternness”),[4][6][7] formed from sevērus (“stern, strict, serious”) and the suffix -itās.[2][4][3] The Latin adjective, the source of severe, is of uncertain origin.[3] Etymonline reports that de Vaan, like Watkins, takes it as probably a suffixed form of Proto-Indo-European *segh- (“to have, hold”).[3][8] Compare Italian severità, Spanish severidad and Portuguese severidade.[2]

Earliest recorded meaning

Strictness or austerity of life and morals: 1481, in Caxton's translation of Cicero's De Senectute.[2][3] The noun is recorded some sixty years before the adjective severe, which Etymonline dates to the 1540s.[3]

Semantic evolution

Strictness in dealing with others, especially in discipline and punishment, is recorded from 1530, in a letter of Wolsey's,[2] or from the 1520s in Etymonline,[3] and an act of severity from before 1538.[2] Johnson (1755) put "cruel treatment; sharpness of punishment" first, quoting Shakespeare.[9] In the 17th and 18th centuries the word spread to the mind and to style: strict accuracy or exactness (1638), harshness of criticism (1660), a stern look (1711) and austere plainness of style or taste (1713).[2] From before 1676 it was used of harsh weather, especially extreme cold,[2] from 1808 of the violence of an illness, and since 1835 of the grievousness of pain or penalties,[2] the sense in which it is now most often used of things.[8][4] Etymonline notes that the OED marks severeness (1570s) as rare.[3]

Timeline

  • 1481 – strictness or austerity of life.[2][3]
  • 1530 – strictness in dealing with others, rigour in punishment.[2]
  • 1638 – strict accuracy or exactness.[2]
  • 1660 – harshness of judgement or criticism.[2]
  • before 1676 – harshness of weather or climate.[2]
  • 1713 – austere plainness of style.[2]
  • 1808 – the violence of an illness.[2]
  • 1835 – the grievousness of pain or penalties.[2]

Modern meaning

Noun

  1. The quality of being severe: strictness or harshness in treatment or judgement.
  2. The seriousness or intensity of something bad, such as an illness, storm or cold spell: The severity of the drought surprised the farmers.
  3. An act of severe behaviour, especially a punishment.
  4. Austere plainness of style or taste.
  5. Strict accuracy or rigour.

Word family

  • overseverity

References

  1. ^ a b 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 Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
  3. ^ a b c d e f g h i Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
  4. ^ a b c d Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
  5. ^ Anglo-Norman Dictionary (AND2), Aberystwyth University, anglo-norman.net (2nd ed., 2005–)
  6. ^ Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
  7. ^ Dictionary.com Unabridged (2016), based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, New York: Random House
  8. ^ a b The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (online 2024), 5th ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
  9. ^ Johnson, Samuel (1755), A Dictionary of the English Language, London; 4th ed. 1773; Johnson's Dictionary Online, ed. Beth Rapp Young et al.