Etymologically
Log in

seisir

History Permalink

Etymology and origin of the Old French word seisir

Confidence
Disputed
Formation
Borrowing
First attested
c. 1100 Chanson de Roland More words from the 11th century
Borrowed from
Old High German *sazjan
Ultimate origin
Old High German *sazjan
Etymology tree
inherited borrowed derived
Old French seisir
English seize
From the same root
English seizure ← seisir

Forms

seisir (present participle seisissant; past participle seisi; first-person singular present seisis)[1]

Chrétien de Troyes writes seisir, seisist and seisira.[4]

Etymology

It is borrowed from Old High German *sazjan (“to set, put in possession”) according to the TLFi, which compares Middle High German setzen in its use for putting someone in possession of something.[5][6] The verb is recorded about 700 in the Latin of the barbarian law codes as saciō (“to take possession”), and Wiktionary derives the Old French word from that form.[5][7][1]

Bloch and Wartburg reject Frankish *sakjan (“to claim one's rights”), reconstructed from Old High German sahha (“lawsuit”), because the sense of putting someone in possession would not follow from it.[7] They also reject *satjan, the source of German setzen, which would have given a form without /z/, as *hatjan gave haïr.[7] Their solution is the Old High German form, which western Frankish could share since it took part in the High German shift of /t/ to /z/ around 800, so that the word entered Gallo-Romance rather late.[7][8] The Latin verb itself Wiktionary takes from the Frankish verb that Bloch and Wartburg reject, while Greimas thinks of a cross between that verb and *satjan.[1][9] Guiraud, cited by the DHLF, derives the Latin form from satiō (“to satisfy”).[8] Old Occitan sazir had both senses, and Italian sagire was borrowed from Gallo-Romance like other feudal terms.[7]

Earliest recorded meaning

The first record is the Chanson de Roland, about 1100, in its Oxford manuscript of about 1125, where the verb already has several senses: to put someone in possession of something, to take something firmly in hand, to seize a person and to capture a military objective.[5][10][11]

Semantic evolution

The word was properly a term of feudal law, both “to put in possession” and “to take possession”; the second led to the general sense of seizing quickly.[7][7] The TLFi takes the first for the original sense, from which the reflexive soi saisir de led to taking possession and grasping.[5] Tobler–Lommatzsch lists taking possession, grasping, attacking, besieging and choosing, and Chrétien de Troyes uses it for taking someone or something by force or quickly, for taking one of two courses, and for appropriating.[12][4]

The legal maxim le mort saisit le vif “the dead puts the living in possession” is recorded from 1270,[5] and about 1200 the verb was used of a feeling taking hold of the mind.[5] The modern word saisir keeps both the legal and the physical senses.[5]

Timeline

  • c. 1100 – several senses in the Chanson de Roland.[5][10][11]
  • 1100–1125 – saisit in the Voyage de saint Brendan, written in England.[13]
  • 1121–1125 – the earliest Anglo-Norman record the AND cites.[2]
  • c. 1170 – seisir in Chrétien de Troyes's Erec et Enide.[4]
  • c. 1200 – of an emotion seizing the mind.[5]
  • 1270 – le mort saisit le vif.[5]

Meanings

Verb

  1. to take possession of, occupy.[12][2]
  2. to seize, grasp, take hold of.[14][4]
  3. to attack; to besiege.[15][2]
  4. to choose, take (one of two courses).[15][4]
  5. to put in possession, invest with; to provide.[15][2]
  6. reflexive: to make oneself master of.[16]
  7. past participle seisi: in possession (of).[17][2]

Anglo-Norman

The AND heads the word seisir, first cites it from 1121–1125 and lists many spellings, among them ceysir, seiser, sesir, seysir and sayzir.[2] Beside seizing and grasping, the insular record is rich in legal senses: to take legal possession of a property or privilege, to take custody of a minor, to confiscate, and the participle for one seised of a property, with the phrase for dying seised of it.[2] Middle English seisen, from the middle of the 13th century, was taken from the Old French verb,[18] and English has both seize and the legal seise.[18]

Descendants

Usage notes

The dictionaries head the word saisir (Tobler–Lommatzsch, the DÉCT, the DMF), seisir (the AND) and *sazjan (the FEW).[12][4][2][6]

References

  1. ^ a b c d e Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
  2. ^ a b c d e f g h i Anglo-Norman Dictionary (AND2), Aberystwyth University, anglo-norman.net (2nd ed., 2005–), p. s.v. seisir
  3. ^ FROLEX 3.0, lexique morphologique du français médiéval (IXe–XVe s.), Base de français médiéval, ENS de Lyon (from the BFM, the Nouveau Corpus d'Amsterdam and the DMF), github.com/sheiden/Medieval-French-Language-Toolkit
  4. ^ a b c d e f Dictionnaire électronique de Chrétien de Troyes (DÉCT), LFA / Université d'Ottawa – ATILF, CNRS / Université de Lorraine (2014), p. s.v. saisir
  5. ^ a b c d e f g h i j Trésor de la langue française informatisé (2004), ATILF – CNRS & Université de Lorraine, atilf.fr/tlfi; electronic version of Imbs, Paul; Quemada, Bernard, eds. (1971–1994), Trésor de la langue française, Paris: CNRS / Gallimard
  6. ^ a b Wartburg, Walther von, et al. (1922–2002), Französisches Etymologisches Wörterbuch, 25 vols., Bonn / Leipzig / Basel: Klopp / Teubner / Zbinden, p. 17:19
  7. ^ a b c d e f g Bloch, Oscar; Wartburg, Walther von (1989), Dictionnaire étymologique de la langue française, 8th ed., Paris: Presses universitaires de France, p. 609
  8. ^ a b Rey, Alain, ed. (1992), Dictionnaire historique de la langue française, Paris: Le Robert, p. s.v. saisir
  9. ^ Greimas, Algirdas Julien (1979), Dictionnaire de l'ancien français jusqu'au milieu du XIVe siècle, 2nd ed., Paris: Larousse (printing of 1988), p. s.v. saisir
  10. ^ a b Möhren, Frankwalt, Dictionnaire étymologique de l'ancien français (DEAF): Complément bibliographique, electronic version (DEAFBiblEl), Heidelberger Akademie der Wissenschaften, alma.hadw-bw.de/deafbibl (texts by siglum, with their dates), p. RolS
  11. ^ a b UD Old French PROFITEROLE and UD Middle French PROFITEROLE treebanks, Universal Dependencies (from the SRCMF and the Base de français médiéval; texts by DEAF siglum), p. RolS
  12. ^ a b c Tobler, Adolf; Lommatzsch, Erhard (1925–2002), Altfranzösisches Wörterbuch, 11 vols., Berlin / Wiesbaden / Stuttgart: Weidmann / Steiner, p. 9:92
  13. ^ Rainsford, Thomas, CorMétAF: lemmatised extracts of Old and Middle French verse and prose (990–1500), github (texts by siglum), p. BrendanS
  14. ^ Tobler, Adolf; Lommatzsch, Erhard (1925–2002), Altfranzösisches Wörterbuch, 11 vols., Berlin / Wiesbaden / Stuttgart: Weidmann / Steiner, p. 9:93
  15. ^ a b c Tobler, Adolf; Lommatzsch, Erhard (1925–2002), Altfranzösisches Wörterbuch, 11 vols., Berlin / Wiesbaden / Stuttgart: Weidmann / Steiner, p. 9:94
  16. ^ Tobler, Adolf; Lommatzsch, Erhard (1925–2002), Altfranzösisches Wörterbuch, 11 vols., Berlin / Wiesbaden / Stuttgart: Weidmann / Steiner, p. 9:95
  17. ^ Tobler, Adolf; Lommatzsch, Erhard (1925–2002), Altfranzösisches Wörterbuch, 11 vols., Berlin / Wiesbaden / Stuttgart: Weidmann / Steiner, p. 9:96
  18. ^ a b Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
Cite this entry

“Seisir.” Etymologically, 13 Nov. 2026, etymologically.com/fro/seisir. Accessed 13 Nov. 2026.

Last edited on . ·