Rave first showed up in the
early fourteenth century as a
word for someone showing signs of madness. It comes from the Old French raver, a variant of resver, which means either to dream or
to be crazy. Before that, no one knows where it came from. Though it seems like
they would fit together, ravage is not related to rave.
Ravage comes from the Old French word ravage,
destruction, and ravir, to take away.
There’s also ravish, which comes from ravir as well, as does the word rapid,
meaning rave is quite alone in the etymological word.
Sources
University of Texas at Austin
Linguistic Research Center
Hi JE - interesting to see that 'Rave' as used in early medieval days described a type of craziness or madness.
ReplyDeleteThen the other variants .. fascinating .. cheers Hilary
Signs of madness, like a raving lunatic.
ReplyDeleteI'm a raving lunatic. :)
ReplyDeleteI also want to rave about your blog.
T
*puts down glow stick*
ReplyDeleteDang it ... :)
I love word etymology. So interesting!
ReplyDeleteHope you are enjoying the A to Z challenge! Here’s my A to Z Post on Memorable Characters
This makes me wonder whether "rave" could possibly be related to "rove," in the sense of wandering or going astray. What think you?
ReplyDeleteRaving is a sign of madness, methinks....
ReplyDeleteWhat, no loud music? No glow sticks? *sigh*
ReplyDeleteActually, seeing rave as madness isn't too surprising. I've read a lot of books dealing with the Medieval time period and later and I've seen it used that way.
Well, in another form, rave as raving is so often used to describe a lunatic.
ReplyDeleteRave is an orphan word, huh? Strange. I WOULD think it was related to ravage and ravish.
ReplyDeleteAnd I was in the mood to party...
ReplyDeleteI thought it might have been related to the other rav words, but I'm wrong.
ReplyDeleteNever thought rave had to anything with craziness! Interesting!
ReplyDelete