redress
Language: English
Part of speech: verb
Pronunciation: ipa: /ɹɪˈdɹɛs/
ipa: /ɹiˈdɹɛs/
ipa: /ɹəˈdɹɛs/
rhymes: -ɛs
Forms: form: redresses
form: redressing
form: redressed
form: redressed
Etymology: From Middle English redressen, from Anglo-Norman radresser, redrescer, redrescier and Middle French redresser (“to stand (someone or something) up; to stand up again; to rebuild, to repair something damaged, to rectify, to restore; to obtain redress; to cure; (of hair) to stand on end; to revise a judgment”) (modern French redresser), from Old French redrecier (“to stand (someone or something) up; to stand up again”), from Old French re- (“again, once more”) (from Latin re-, from Proto-Italic *wre (“again”); further etymology uncertain) + Old French drechier, drecier, dresser (“to dress; to stand up”) (from Vulgar Latin *drēctiāre, a contracted form of *dirēctiāre, from Latin dīrectus (“straight”)).
Compare Catalan redreçar, Spanish redreçar (obsolete), Italian redreçare, redrezare, redricciare, ridirizzare (all obsolete), ridrizzare, Late Latin redressare (“to repair; to set right”), Old Occitan redreisar, redresar.
Senses: examples: text: Let us divide our labours; thou, where choice / Leads thee, or where most needs, whether to wind / The woodbine round this arbour, or direct / The clasping ivy where to climb; while I, / In yonder spring of roses intermixed / With myrtle, find what to redress till noon: […]
ref: 1667, John Milton, Paradise Lost. A Poem Written in Ten Books, London: Printed [by Samuel Simmons], and are to be sold by Peter Parker under Creed Church neer Aldgate; And by Robert Boulter at the Turks Head in Bishopsgate-street; and Matthias Walker, under St. Dunstons Church in Fleet-street, OCLC 767532218, book IX; republished as John Milton; Elijah Fenton; Samuel Johnson, Paradise Lost, by John Milton. To which are Prefixed, the Life of the Author, by Elijah Fenton; and a Criticism on the Poem, by Dr. Johnson, London: Printed for John Bumpus, Holborn-Bars, 1821, OCLC 563126389, page 256
text: Sir; When last in Philadelphia, you mentioned to me your wish that I should re-dress a certain paper, which you had prepared. As it is important, that a thing of this kind should be done with great care, and much at leisure, touched and retouched, I submit a wish, that, as soon as you have given it the body you mean it to have, it may be sent to me.
ref: 1796 May 10, Alexander Hamilton, letter to George Washington; quoted in George Washington; Jared Sparks, compiler, “Washington's Farewell Address [Appendix, No. III]”, in The Writings of George Washington; being His Correspondence, Addresses, Messages, and Other Papers, Official and Private, Selected and Published from the Original Manuscripts; with a Life of the Author, Notes, and Illustrations, volume XII (Part Fifth; Comprising Speeches and Messages to Congress, Proclamations, and Addresses), Boston, Mass.: American Stationers' Company; John B. Russell; Cambridge, Mass.: Folsom, Wells, and Thurston, 1837, OCLC 29437768, page 391
glosses: To put in order again; to set right; to revise.
examples: text: And for thoſe Wrongs, thoſe bitter Iniuries, […] / I doubt not, but with Honor to redreſſe.
ref: 1591, William Shakespeare, “The First Part of Henry the Sixt”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies: Published According to the True Originall Copies, London: Printed by Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, act II, scene v, page 105, column 2:
glosses: To set right (a wrong); to repair, (an injury or damage); to make amends for; to remedy; to relieve from.
examples: text: Nor envy we / Thy great reknown, nor grudge thy victory; / 'Tis thine, O king! the afflicted to redress, / And fame has fill'd the world with thy success: […]
ref: 1806, John Dryden, “Palamon and Arcite; or, The Knight's Tale. From [Geoffrey] Chaucer.”, in Thomas Park, editor, Fables from Bocaccio and Chaucer: … In Two Volumes. Collated with the Best Editions: … (The Works of the British Poets: Including Translations from the Greek and Roman Authors), volume I, London: Printed at the Stanhope Press, by Charles Whittingham, Union Buildings, Leather Lane; for John Sharpe, opposite York-House, Piccadilly, →OCLC, book I, page 25:
text: Hereditary bondsmen! know ye not / Who would be free themselves must strike the blow? / By their right arms the conquest must be wrought? / Will Gaul or Muscovite redress ye? no!
ref: 1812, Lord Byron, Childe Harold's Pilgrimage, a Romaunt: And Other Poems, 4th edition, London: Printed by T[homas] Davison, Whitefriars, for John Murray, Fleet-Street; Edinburgh: William Blackwood, and J. Ballantyne and Co.; Dublin: J. Cumming, →OCLC, canto II, stanza LXXV, page 102:
text: [Magna Charta] [I]f we, our justiciary, our bailiffs, or any of our officers, shall in any circumstance fail in the performance of them, towards any person, or shall break through any of these articles of peace and security, and the offence be notified to four barons chosen out of the five-and-twenty before mentioned, the said four barons shall repair to us, or our justiciary, if we are out of the realm, and laying open the grievance, shall petition to have it redressed without delay: and if it be not redressed by us, or if we should chance to be out of the realm, if it should not be redressed by our justiciary, within forty days, […] the said five-and-twenty barons, together with the community of the whole kingdom, shall distrain and distress us all the ways possible, by seizing our castles, lands, possessions, and in other manner they can, till the grievance is redressed according to their pleasure; […]
ref: 1847, Augustin Thierry; William Hazlitt, transl., “The Anglo-Normans and the English by Race”, in History of the Conquest of England by the Normans: Its Causes, and Its Consequences, in England, Scotland, Ireland, and on the Continent … Translated from the 7th Paris edition by William Hazlitt, …, volume II, London: D. Bogue, OCLC 458279441; reprinted Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2011, pages=357–358, footnote
glosses: To make amends or compensation to; to relieve of anything unjust or oppressive; to bestow relief upon.
examples: text: Syr ſaid Dynadan I ſhalle gyue you my beholdynge / wel ſaid Palomydes / thenne ſhall ye ſee how we ſhalle redreſſe our myghtes
ref: 1470–1485 (date produced), Thomas Malory, “Capitulum xviij”, in [Le Morte Darthur], book X, [London: […] by William Caxton], published 31 July 1485, →OCLC, leaf 222, recto; republished as H[einrich] Oskar Sommer, editor, Le Morte Darthur […], London: David Nutt, […], 1889, →OCLC, page 443, lines 19–21:
glosses: To put upright again; to restore.
Derived terms: redresser
self-redress