Word Origin Atlas

Exact historical dictionary sense

Relief in Webster's 1913 dictionary

The 1913 record labels relief as noun. Its source-bounded etymology and selected historical definition appear below.

WEBSTER 1913noun
Relief

[OE. relef, F. relief, properly, a lifting up, a standing out. See Relieve, and cf. Basrelief, Rilievi.]

Cross-verified historical sense
The source text may be outdated. The page preserves that historical boundary.
Cross-verified 1913 record
Headwordrelief
Part of speechnoun
Historical etymology[OE. relef, F. relief, properly, a lifting up, a standing out. See Relieve, and cf. Basrelief, Rilievi.]
Selected historical definitionThe act of relieving, or the state of being relieved; the removal, or partial removal, of any evil, or of anything oppressive or burdensome, by which some ease is obtained; succor; alleviation; comfort; ease; redress.
Signed record IDwebster1913-relief-noun-1d0b8c935357
Source locatorCIDE.R, paragraph 4574; Gutenberg eBook 667
Edition-scoped answerNot earliest-attestation proofNot modern consensus
Independent historical textProject Gutenberg section 667Signed structural record sourceGNU GCIDE 0.54 archive
Quick answer

In Webster's Revised Unabridged Dictionary (1913), "relief" is labeled noun. Its etymology is recorded as: "[OE. relef, F. relief, properly, a lifting up, a standing out. See Relieve, and cf. Basrelief, Rilievi.]" The selected historical definition says: "The act of relieving, or the state of being relieved; the removal, or partial removal, of any evil, or of anything oppressive or burdensome, by which some ease is obtained; succor; alleviation; comfort; ease; redress."

Project Gutenberg Webster 1913 plus signed GNU GCIDE 0.54 Exact cross-verified historical record reviewed 2026-10-04

What this answer proves

One named sense in one historical dictionary edition.

The answer reports the selected headword, part of speech, etymology, definition, and source locator as transcribed in the cross-verified 1913 record.

Evidence boundaryIt does not establish the earliest attestation or a complete borrowing chain.It does not claim current scholarly consensus or a modern dictionary definition.Historical dictionary text may be obsolete, incomplete, inaccurate, or offensive by modern standards.

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