stagger

Etymology

It is inherited from Middle English stageren, recorded about 1434,^[2] an altered form of Middle English stakeren (“to walk unsteadily, stagger”),^[2][3][4][5] which survives in dialect as stacker.^[4][6][7] The Middle English verb is borrowed from Old Norse stakra (“to push, to stagger”),^[4][6][8][9] a frequentative of staka (“to push, to stagger”).^{[4][6][8][10]} Barnhart and Merriam-Webster Unabridged relate the Old Norse verb to Middle Low German staken (“to push”) and to Old English staca, the source of stake.^[2][8] The OED and Etymonline compare Middle Dutch staggeren (“to stagger like a drunk man”), Dutch staggelen (“to stagger”) and German staggeln (“to stammer”).^[4][3] Johnson took the verb from Dutch.^[11]

Earliest recorded meaning

To totter or reel in walking: the ancestor form stakeren is first recorded before 1300 in the Cursor Mundi,^[4][5] and Barnhart dates it before 1325.^[2] The form stagger itself appears about 1434 in Barnhart's dating,^[2] in the mid-15th century in Etymonline's,^[3] and in 1530, in Palsgrave's French–English dictionary, in the OED's.^[4]

Semantic evolution

In Middle English stakeren could also mean to stammer and to waver or vacillate;^[5][4] Chaucer used it once.^[12][13] The figurative sense of wavering in an opinion or purpose passed to stagger (1533, in Thomas More), though it is now rare,^[4] and an army or line of battle was said to stagger, give way, from 1544.^[4] The transitive sense, to cause to reel and hence to bewilder or amaze, is recorded by Barnhart in 1556, and by Etymonline in the 1550s.^[2][3] Johnson (1755) defined the transitive verb as "to make to reel" and "to shock; to alarm; to make less steady or confident", with quotations from Shakespeare.^[11] Weekley thought that the phrase to stagger belief was perhaps due to Burke.^[13] The noun staggers, a disease of domestic animals, named for its reeling gait, appears in 1577, and stagger, an act of staggering, in 1600.^[4][2][3] The idea of a zigzag gave the sense "to arrange in an alternating pattern" in 1856, and that of setting hours or holidays so that they do not coincide in 1918, in American English.^[2][3][8] The noun was used in aeronautics from 1915 for the forward set of a biplane's upper wing.^[4] In American slang, from about 1865 (in Mark Twain), a stagger was an attempt, as in make a stagger at,^[14][4] and in Ulster dialect the noun meant an attempt or undertaking.^[15]

Timeline

• before 1300 – stakeren, to totter, reel.^[4][5]
• c. 1434 – the form stageren.^[2]
• 1530 – to sway or totter when trying to stand or walk.^[4]
• 1533 – to waver in an opinion or purpose.^[4]
• 1544 – of an army, to waver, give way.^[4]
• 1556 – to bewilder, amaze.^[2]
• 1577 – the staggers, a disease of domestic animals.^[4][2][8]
• 1600 – noun, an act of staggering.^[4][2]
• 1840 – of a ship, to move unsteadily, especially under a press of sail.^[4]
• 1856 – to arrange in a zigzag pattern.^[2][3]
• c. 1865 – noun, an attempt or try (American slang).^[14][4]
• 1915 – a staggered arrangement, especially of the wings of a biplane.^[4]
• 1918 – to schedule hours or holidays so that they do not coincide.^[2][3][8]
• 1964 – a rough first run-through of a play or programme (theatre slang).^[4]

Meanings

Verb

1. To walk or move unsteadily, as if about to fall; to reel or totter: The porter staggered up the stairs under the trunk.^[16][8]
2. To make someone walk unsteadily: The punch staggered him.^[16][11]
3. To astound or overwhelm, as with shock: We were staggered by the size of the bill.^[16][8][11]
4. To arrange in alternating or overlapping positions, or to spread over different times so as to avoid crowding: The firm staggers its lunch breaks.^[16][8][2]
5. To falter or hesitate; to waver in purpose.^[16][4]
6. To set the wings of a biplane so that the leading edge of one is ahead of the other.^[16][4]

Noun

1. An unsteady, reeling movement.^[4][7]
2. the staggers: any of several diseases of domestic animals marked by a reeling gait and lack of coordination; also, a similar state of giddiness in a person.^[8][4][7]
3. A staggered arrangement, as of the wings of a biplane.^[4][8]

Word family

• staggerer
• staggery
• staggerbush

Related words

• stacker
• stake

Usage notes

The OED records several rarer nouns of the same spelling: a thorn bush replanted from one hedge to another (1739–1879), of uncertain origin and also listed by the English Dialect Dictionary for Shropshire, Herefordshire and Berkshire;^[4][15] a hunter of stags (1865), from stag;^[4][7] and a lookout or watcher (1859, in Hotten's slang dictionary), from the slang verb stag.^[4][14] Dictionary.com distinguishes stagger, reel and totter as words for an unsteady way of walking.^[17]

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 Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
3. ^ a b c d e f g h Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
4. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s t u v w x y z 27 28 29 30 31 Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
5. ^ 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)
6. ^ a b c Hoad, T. F., ed. (1986), The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology, Oxford: Clarendon Press
7. ^ a b c d Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
8. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
9. ^ Skeat, Walter W. (1911), A Concise Etymological Dictionary of the English Language, new ed., Oxford: Clarendon Press
10. ^ Stevenson, Angus, ed. (2010), Oxford Dictionary of English, 3rd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
11. ^ a b c d Johnson, Samuel (1755), A Dictionary of the English Language, London; 4th ed. 1773; Johnson's Dictionary Online, ed. Beth Rapp Young et al.
12. ^ Benson, Larry D., Glossarial Concordance to Middle English (Chaucer, Gower), Johns Hopkins University, github.com/jhu-digital-manuscripts/gcme
13. ^ a b Weekley, Ernest (1921), An Etymological Dictionary of Modern English, London: John Murray
14. ^ a b c Green, Jonathon (2010), Green's Dictionary of Slang, London: Chambers; digital ed. 2016–, https://greensdictofslang.com
15. ^ a b Wright, Joseph, ed. (1898–1905), The English Dialect Dictionary, 6 vols., Oxford: Henry Frowde; via EDD Online 4.0, University of Innsbruck (CC BY 4.0)
16. ^ a b c d e f Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins
17. ^ Dictionary.com Unabridged (2016), based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, New York: Random House