English
adjust
Adjust comes from Middle English ajusten.
- Middle Englishc. 1150–1500ajusten
- Englishearliest quotation 1892adjust
attested reconstructed ? uncertain or disputed
Earlier history uncertain.
Lineage
- Middle Englishc. 1150–1500ajusten
- Englishearliest quotation 1892adjust
Earliest quotation: 1892, W. Robertson Smith, The Old Testament in the Jewish Church: “Murder is dealt with by the law of blood-revenge,…”
A compound of ad ‘to, up to, towards’ + iustus ‘correct, proper, exact’
Proto-Indo-European *h₂éd ‘near, at’
Proto-Italic *ad ‘toward, to, on, up to, for’
Latin ad ‘to, up to, towards’
Proto-Indo-European *h₂yew- ‘straight, upright, right’
Proto-Indo-European *h₂yéwos
Proto-Italic *jowos ‘court of law’
Archaic Latin *iowos
Archaic Latin iovestos
Latin iustus ‘correct, proper, exact’
The story
Probably influenced in sense by Old French ajouster (cf. modern ajouter), from Vulgar Latin *adiuxtāre, from Latin iuxta. The Middle English originally meant "to correct, remedy" in the late 14th century, and was reborrowed from Middle French in the early 17th century. According to another view on the etymology, the word was actually derived from Old French ajouster and then supposedly later influenced by folk etymology from Latin iustus; if so, it is a doublet of adjute.folk etymology The source marks this as unproven or a folk etymology. Quoted, not asserted.
Every English word from Middle English ajusten
Today it means
verb To modify.
Language periods are conventional ranges, not dates for this word.
Etymograph / Middle English ajusten / adjust