vehement

Etymology

It is inherited from Middle English vehement,^[2] borrowed from Middle French vehement,^[3][4][5] recorded as Old French vehement and veement from the 12th century,^[6][2] and partly a direct borrowing of its source,^[3][7][8] borrowed from Latin vehemēns (“violent, impetuous, carried away”), also vēmēns.^[3][6] The further origin of the Latin adjective is debated.^[6][3] The revised OED and Etymonline take it as probably related to vehō (“to carry”),^[3][6] from Proto-Indo-European *wegh- (“to go, move, transport in a vehicle”),^[6][9] which is also the root of vehicle.^[10][3] Barnhart explains it as a lost middle participle of that verb, meaning "carrying oneself, rushing", later reshaped under the influence of mēns (“mind”).^[4] The older view, held by Skeat and the 1989 edition of the OED, is that it means "out of one's mind", from a prefix vē- (“lacking”), as in vēcors (“senseless”), and the noun for "mind", altered through association with the verb for "carry".^[11][6][8] The OED now rejects this, because most of the senses involve movement and not insanity,^[3] and Etymonline quotes de Vaan's support for Guiraud's view that the form with -h- is the older one and that the word means "who gets carried away".^[6] Dictionary.com calls the derivation uncertain.^[12] The OED compares Spanish vehemente, Portuguese veemente and Italian veemente.^[3]

Earliest recorded meaning

Of pain or illness, severe, virulent: probably before 1425, in a medical manuscript that the MED quotes as "Þe canker is a vehement enpostume".^[2][3] Barnhart gives the same date and the sense "intense, severe",^[4] and Etymonline says early 15th century.^[6]

Semantic evolution

In French the adjective was first used of natural forces, especially wind, and only later of sensations, of suspicions and arguments, and of passionate people.^[3] In English the order differs: first pain and illness, then in the 1480s and 1490s the force of wind, a strong suspicion, a strong flavour and intense feeling.^[3][2] The MED already has a vehement sound in Bokenham, before 1460,^[2] about a century before the OED's first loud noise.^[3] The physical uses have since faded: pain, heat and cold are now rarely called vehement,^[8][3] wind and rain only archaically,^[8] and the old sense of a powerful medicine survives only in historical writing.^[3] The sense of a very strong suspicion, originally Scottish, is now chiefly archaic too.^[3] Johnson (1755) still listed "violent; forcible" first and "ardent; eager; fervent" second,^[13] whereas the modern dictionaries put feeling and conviction first and add the sense of bitter hostility, as in a heated debate.^[5][14]

Timeline

• before 1425 – of pain or illness, severe, virulent.^[3][2][4]
• 1483 – of wind or another natural force, very strong or violent.^[3][2]
• c. 1485 – of suspicion or likelihood, very strong, originally in Scottish use.^[3]
• 1490 – of taste or smell, strong, pungent.^[3]
• before 1492 – of a thought or emotion, intense, ardent, passionate.^[3] Barnhart first records the sense "eager, passionate, forceful" in 1526.^[4]
• 1528 – of heat or cold, intense; of colour or light, vivid.^[3]
• 1530 – of proof, powerfully convincing.^[3]
• 1531 – of a person's action, performed with great effort or force.^[3]

Meanings

Adjective

1. Showing strong feeling or firm conviction; passionate or emphatic: She issued a vehement denial of the rumours.^[14][5]
2. Marked by bitter hostility; heated: The two councillors had a vehement argument over the budget.^[5]
3. Done with great force or energy: He answered with a vehement thump on the table.^[14][3][8]
4. (archaic) Of wind or rain, blowing or falling very violently.^[8][3]
5. (rare) Of pain, illness, heat or cold, severe or intense.^[8][3]
6. (rare) Of colour or light, vivid, intensely bright.^[8][3]

Word family

• vehemence
• vehemently
• overvehement
• unvehement

Related words

• vehicle
• way
• weigh

Usage notes

Barnhart notes that until the 19th century dictionaries recognized only a pronunciation with h for vehement, vehemence and vehicle, though by then it had become unusual in Britain and rarer in the United States.^[4] The OED still lists forms with and without h on both sides of the Atlantic.^[3]

References

1. ^ a b Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g 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)
3. ^ 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 Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
4. ^ a b c d e f Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
5. ^ a b c d Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
6. ^ a b c d e f g h Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
7. ^ Hoad, T. F., ed. (1986), The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology, Oxford: Clarendon Press
8. ^ a b c d e f g h Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
9. ^ The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (online 2024), 5th ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
10. ^ Klein, Ernest. A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the English Language. 2 vols. Amsterdam: Elsevier, 1966–1967.
11. ^ Skeat, Walter W. (1911), A Concise Etymological Dictionary of the English Language, new ed., Oxford: Clarendon Press
12. ^ Dictionary.com Unabridged (2016), based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, New York: Random House
13. ^ Johnson, Samuel (1755), A Dictionary of the English Language, London; 4th ed. 1773; Johnson's Dictionary Online, ed. Beth Rapp Young et al.
14. ^ a b c Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins