English
séance
Séance comes from French séance ‘sitting, session’, and goes back to séant.
- Frenchc. 1600–presentséant
- French, derivedc. 1600–presentséance‘sitting, session’
- Englishearliest quotation 1936same form
attested reconstructed ? uncertain or disputed
Earlier history uncertain.
Lineage
- Frenchc. 1600–presentséant
- French, derivedc. 1600–presentséance‘sitting, session’
- Englishearliest quotation 1936same form
Earliest quotation: 1936, Rollo Ahmed, The Black Art: “[B]ut only too often séances degenerate into pure sorcery…”
Linked words
through Proto-Indo-European *sed- ‘to sit’
set, sell, sit, sitting, seat, method, chair, settle, nest, possess, niche, saddle, exodus, subsidy, nye, beset, prasad, cathode, soot, setter, chaise, anode, sate, besiege, ersatz, salo, nidal, polyhedron, nias, 80 more
through Proto-Italic *sedēō ‘to sit, to be sitting, to be seated’
possession, obsession, assessor, presidente, assize, 23 more
through Latin sedeō ‘[I] sit, [I] am seated’
president, size, session, resident, assess, siege, reside, residue, residual, sediment, sedan, insidious, possessive, sedentary, dissident, sedative, obsess, sedate, presidio, sessile, presidium, 27 more
through French séance ‘sitting, session’
Today it means
noun A ceremony where people try to communicate with the spirits of dead people, usually led by a medium.
Language periods are conventional ranges, not dates for this word.
Etymograph / French séant / séance