specific

Pronunciation

• IPA: /spəˈsɪf.ɪk/^[1]

Etymology

It is borrowed from French spécifique and directly borrowed from Late Latin specificus (“constituting a kind or sort”),^[2][3] in Medieval Latin “specific, particular”,^[2] from Latin speciēs (“kind, sort”) + -ficus (“making, doing”),^[2][4][5] from the combining form of facere (“to make”).^[2] The earlier English form was specifical, from the early 15th century.^[2]

Earliest recorded meaning

“Having a special determining quality”: before 1631, in Donne's poems,^[3][6] or the 1630s.^[2]

Semantic evolution

The word began in the language of logic and natural history, of what constitutes a species or kind,^[6][3] and of qualities peculiar to a thing, from about 1650.^[6] In medicine a remedy was specific when it acted on one particular disease, from 1677,^[6] and the noun specific, such a remedy, is from 1661, in John Evelyn's Fumifugium.^[3][5] The everyday sense “definite, precise, explicit” is from 1740.^[3][2] The noun for a particular detail, as in the specifics of the case, is from 1697^[3] or the 1690s.^[2] Specific gravity is from 1666, in Robert Boyle.^[3]

Timeline

• before 1631 – having a special quality.^[3]
• 1661 – noun, a specific remedy.^[3]
• 1666 – specific gravity.^[3]
• 1677 – of remedies, acting on one disease.^[6]
• 1697 – noun, a detail, particular.^[3]
• 1740 – definite, precise, explicit.^[3][2]

Modern meaning

Adjective

1. Clearly stated; definite and precise.
2. Belonging to or characteristic of a particular thing: specific to the region.
3. (biology) Relating to a species.
4. (medicine) Acting on a particular disease: a specific remedy.
5. (physics) Of a quantity, expressed per unit of mass or volume: specific heat.

Noun

1. (usually plural) A particular detail or item.
2. (medicine) A remedy for a particular disease.

Word family

• specifically
• gender-specific
• prespecific
• stereospecific
• specificity
• prostate-specific antigen
• specific humidity
• specific volume

Related words

• species
• specify
• specification
• special
• specimen

References

1. ^ Jones, Daniel (2011), Cambridge English Pronouncing Dictionary, 18th ed., ed. Peter Roach, Jane Setter and John Esling, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
3. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
4. ^ The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (2000), 4th ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin
5. ^ a b Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
6. ^ a b c d e Simpson, J. A.; Weiner, E. S. C., eds. (1989), The Oxford English Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Clarendon Press