surveillance

Pronunciation

• IPA: /səˈveɪ.ləns/ (UK); /sɚˈveɪ.ləns/ (US)^[1]

Etymology

It is borrowed from French surveillance (“oversight, a watch”),^[2][3][4] from surveiller (“to oversee, watch”), from sur-, over, and veiller (“to watch”),^[2][3] from Latin vigilāre (“to keep watch”), from vigil (“watchful”) (see vigil).^[2][4][5]

Earliest recorded meaning

Watch kept over a person, especially a suspect: 1799 as a French word in English, 1802 as an English word.^[3][6][2]

Semantic evolution

Etymonline notes that the word seems to have come to English from the Terror in France, where surveillance committees were formed in every municipality in March 1793 to monitor suspects, outsiders and dissidents.^[3] Devices and vessels used for military or police surveillance are from 1947.^[6]

Timeline

• 1793 – French surveillance committees.^[3]
• 1799 – in English, as a French word.^[3][6]
• 1802 – naturalized.^[2]
• 1947 – surveillance devices.^[6]

Modern meaning

Noun

1. Close watch kept over someone or something, especially a suspected criminal.

Word family

• countersurveillance

Related words

• surveil
• vigil
• vigilant
• reveille
• survey

References

1. ^ Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
3. ^ a b c d e f Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
4. ^ a b Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
5. ^ Pearsall, Judy, ed. (1998), The New Oxford Dictionary of English, Oxford: Clarendon Press
6. ^ a b c d Simpson, J. A.; Weiner, E. S. C., eds. (1989), The Oxford English Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Clarendon Press