Rise is the native bottom rung of the ladder rise, mount, ascend — English, French, Latin. It is Old English risan, a strong verb, with relatives across Germanic: Old Norse risa, Gothic urreisan, German reisen, which now means "to travel" but originally meant to rise for a journey.
Its origin beyond Germanic is a puzzle. The Oxford English Dictionary states flatly that no related terms have been traced outside the Germanic languages, and one scholar suggests it came into Germanic from some lost earlier language of Europe. That is a useful reminder that "native" does not mean "explicable all the way down" — a certain amount of core Germanic vocabulary has no Indo-European pedigree at all. The senses of rising from the dead and of rising in revolt are both there by the late 1100s.
rise (v.) Middle English risen , from Old English risan "to rise from sleep, get out of bed; stand up, rise to one's feet; get up from table; rise together; be fit, be proper" (typically gerisan , arisan ; a class I strong verb; past tense ras , past participle risen ), from Proto-Germanic *us-rīsanan "to go up" (source also of Old Norse risa , Old Saxon risan , Old Frisian risa , "to rise; arise, happen," Gothic urreisan "to rise," Old High German risan "to rise, flow," German reisen "to travel," originally "to rise for a journey"). OED writes, "No related terms have been traced outside of Teutonic"; Boutkan suggests an origin in a lost European substrate language. From late 12c. as "to rise from the dead," also "rebel, revolt, stand up in opposition." It is attested from c. 1200 in the senses of "move from a lower to a higher position, move upward; increase in number or amount; rise in fortune, prosper; become prominent;" also, of heavenly bodies, "appear above the horizon." To rise and shine "get up, get out of bed" is by 1916 (earlier it was a religious expression). Of seas, rivers, etc., "increase in height," c. 1300. The meaning "come into existence, originate; result (from)" is by mid-13c. From early 14c. as "occur, happen, come to pass; take place." From 1540s of sound, "ascend in pitch." Also from 1540s of dough. It seems not to have been used of heat or temperature in Middle English; that sense may have developed from the use of the verb in reference to the behavior of fluid in a thermometer or barometer (1650s). Related to raise (v.). Related: Rose ; risen . rise (n.) c. 1400, "a rebellion, a rising up in opposition;" mid-15c., "place elevated above the common level, piece of rising land;" from rise (v.). General sense of "upward movement" is by 1570s; more specific sense of "vertical height of an object or surface, elevation, degree of ascent" is from 1660s. Of heavenly bodies, "appearance above the horizon," by 1590s. The meaning "spring, source, origin, beginning" is from 1620s. As "an advance in wages or salary" by 1836 (compare raise (n.)). The phrase on the rise originally meant "becoming more valuable" (1808). The sense in give rise to "to occasion, cause, bring about" (1705) is the otherwise obsolete meaning "an occasion, a ground or basis" (1640s), which OED writes was "Common c 1650-90." The phrase get a rise out of (someone), by 1829, seems to be a metaphor from angling (1650s) in reference to the action of a fish in coming to the surface to take the bait. also from c. 1400
rise came in through Old English, and its spelling follows that family's conventions.
On the register ladder
English kept all three words for this idea, one from each layer, and the rung is itself the cue: the native word is blunt and concrete, the French one polite, the Latin one formal or technical.
| Old English | French | Latin |
|---|---|---|
| rise | mount | ascend |
Old English in the spelling guide · guess another word's family