statute

Etymology

It is inherited from Middle English statut,^[2][3] borrowed from Old French statut (also estatut),^[4][5][6] and the OED now treats it as partly taken straight from Latin statūtum (“an ordinance”).^[7] Anglo-Norman used statut for a statute, decree or regulation from the 13th century.^[8] The Latin noun is the neuter past participle of statuō (“to set up, establish, decree”), used as a noun;^[5][9][10] that verb is from status (“condition, position”), from stō (“to stand”),^[5][4] from the root Proto-Indo-European *steh₂- (“to stand”).^[5]

Earliest recorded meaning

A ruler's decree or a law of the land: about 1300, in the South English Legendary life of Thomas Becket.^[7][5] Barnhart dates the word to probably before 1300.^[4]

Semantic evolution

The sense of a command from a sovereign died out after the early 18th century,^[7] while the sense of an act passed by a legislature, present from the start, became the main one;^[7] Etymonline notes the narrowing to an ordinance of a legislative body in the late 14th century.^[7][5] From 1389 a statute could also be a rule of a guild, corporation or university,^[7] and in a 15th-century copy of Chaucer's Parliament of Fowls it is something ordained by God or fate.^[7] Johnson (1755) defined it simply as a law or an edict of the legislature.^[11] Used before another noun, it marks a measure or weight fixed by law, as in statute mile, from the 1580s.^[5][2] In northern and Midland English dialects, statute or statty was also the yearly hiring fair at which farm labourers and servants found new places, a sense the OED records from about 1600.^[12][7]

Timeline

• c. 1300 – a ruler's decree; an act of the legislature.^[7][5]
• 1389 – a rule of a guild or corporation.^[7]
• 1397 – the Scottish verb statute, to ordain or decree.^[7]
• 1580s – of measures fixed by law (statute mile).^[5]
• about 1600 – a hiring fair (statute fair).^[7]
• 1725 – last record of the sense "a sovereign's command".^[7]
• 1755 – Johnson: a law; an edict of the legislature.^[11]

Modern meaning

Noun

1. A written law passed by a legislature.
2. A permanent rule made by an institution or corporation for its own affairs.
3. (historical) A decree or edict of a ruler.

Adjective

1. Fixed or set by law, as in the statute mile.

Word family

• statutable
• statutory
• statute book
• statute law
• statute mile
• statute of limitations
• statutory rape

Related words

• statue
• status
• state
• constitute
• institute
• substitute
• destitute

Usage notes

From the 15th to the 19th century statute was also used for statue, probably by association with the Latin sense "something set up".^[7] The EDD still records that use in Yorkshire, Lincolnshire and Somerset dialect.^[12]

References

1. ^ a b Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
3. ^ Klein, Ernest. A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the English Language. 2 vols. Amsterdam: Elsevier, 1966–1967.
4. ^ a b c Barnhart, Robert K., ed. (1995), The Barnhart Concise Dictionary of Etymology, New York: HarperCollins
5. ^ a b c d e f g h i Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
6. ^ The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (online 2024), 5th ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
7. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
8. ^ Anglo-Norman Dictionary (AND2), Aberystwyth University, anglo-norman.net (2nd ed., 2005–)
9. ^ Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
10. ^ Hoad, T. F., ed. (1986), The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology, Oxford: Clarendon Press
11. ^ a b Johnson, Samuel (1755), A Dictionary of the English Language, London; 4th ed. 1773; Johnson's Dictionary Online, ed. Beth Rapp Young et al.
12. ^ 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)