English
exactitude
Exactitude comes from French exactitude ‘exactitude, accuracy’, and goes back to Latin exigō ‘demand, claim as due" or "measure by a…’.
- Latinc. 75 BCE–200 CEexigō‘demand, claim as due" or "measure by a standard, weigh, test’
- Latin, derivedc. 75 BCE–200 CEexactus‘demanded, required, enforced, exacted, having been demanded’perfect passive participle of exigō
- Frenchc. 1600–presentexactitude‘exactitude, accuracy’
- Englishearliest quotation 1851exactitude
attested reconstructed ? uncertain or disputed deepest recorded ancestor
Lineage
- Latinc. 75 BCE–200 CEexigō‘demand, claim as due" or "measure by a standard, weigh, test’
- Latin, derivedc. 75 BCE–200 CEexactus‘demanded, required, enforced, exacted, having been demanded’perfect passive participle of exigō
- Frenchc. 1600–presentexactitude‘exactitude, accuracy’
- Englishearliest quotation 1851exactitude
Earliest quotation: 1851, Herman Melville, The Whale: “[W]hen making a passage from one feeding-ground to another,…”
A compound of ex ‘out’ + agō ‘drive’
Proto-Indo-European *h₁eǵʰs ‘out’
Proto-Italic *eks
Latin ex ‘out’
Proto-Indo-European *h₂eǵ- ‘to drive’
Proto-Indo-European *h₂éǵeti ‘to be driving’
Proto-Italic *agō ‘to drive’
Latin agō ‘drive’
Linked words
through Latin exigō ‘demand, claim as due" or "measure by a…’
through Latin exactus ‘demanded, required, enforced, exacted, having…’
Today it means
noun Attention to small details; accuracy.
Language periods are conventional ranges, not dates for this word.
Etymograph / Latin exigō / exactitude