statue

Pronunciation

• IPA: UK /ˈstætʃ.uː/, /ˈstæt.juː/, US /ˈstætʃ.uː/^[1]

Etymology

It is borrowed from Old French statue (“pagan statue, graven image”), estatue,^[2][3][4] from Latin statua (“image, monumental figure”),^[2][3] a back-formation from statuere, to cause to stand, set up,^[2][3][5] from status, a standing, from stāre (“to stand”) (see stand),^[3][2][6] from PIE Proto-Indo-European *sta- (“to stand”).^[2]

Earliest recorded meaning

A figure of a person or animal in the round: about 1375, in Chaucer's Canterbury Tales.^[3][2][7]

Semantic evolution

Properly the word means that which is set up.^[2] It was loosely used for an image or effigy from about 1386.^[7] The verb, to represent in a statue, is from about 1607 and the sense to turn into a statue (1628) is obsolete;^[7] other verbs tried and mostly discarded were statuize (1719) and statufy (1868).^[2] Statues, the children's game, is attested from 1906.^[2][7] Statuary is from 1563 and statuette 19th-century.^[3][4] In East Anglia a statue was a figure set up in a field as a scarecrow.^[8]

Timeline

• c. 1375 – a sculpted figure.^[3]
• 1563 – statuary.^[3]
• c. 1607 – the verb.^[7]
• 1906 – statues, the game.^[2]

Modern meaning

Noun

1. A figure of a person or animal carved, modelled or cast in stone, bronze, wood or another solid material, usually life-size or larger.

Word family

• statuelike
• statued
• statuesque

Related words

• statuary
• statuette
• stature
• statute
• stand

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 j Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
3. ^ a b c d e f g h Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
4. ^ a b Hoad, T. F., ed. (1986), The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology, Oxford: Clarendon Press
5. ^ Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
6. ^ Pearsall, Judy, ed. (1998), The New Oxford Dictionary of English, Oxford: Clarendon Press
7. ^ a b c d e Simpson, J. A.; Weiner, E. S. C., eds. (1989), The Oxford English Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Clarendon Press
8. ^ 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)