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Origin and history of rapt

rapt(adj.)

late 14c., "carried away in an ecstatic trance," from Latin raptus, past participle of rapere "seize, carry off" (see rape (v.)). A figurative sense, the notion is of being "carried up into Heaven" (bodily or in a dream), as in a saint's vision.

The Latin literal sense of "carried away" also was in English from 1550s. Essentially an alternative past participle of rape, in 15c.-17c. the word also sometimes could mean "raped." The sense of "engrossed" is recorded from c. 1500.

As a Latin past-participle adjective, in English it spawned unthinking the back-formed verb rap "to affect with rapture," which was common c. 1600-1750. Before that, there was a verb rapt "seize or grasp, seize and carry off; ravish" (1570s), also "enrapture, transport as with ecstasy" (1590s). There also was a noun rapt in 15c. meaning both "rapture" and "rape."

also from late 14c.

Entries linking to rapt

rape(v.)

late 14c., rapen, "seize prey; abduct, take and carry off by force," from rape (n.) and from Anglo-French raper (Old French rapir) "to seize, abduct," a legal term, probably from Latin rapere "seize, carry off by force, abduct" (see rapid). Also figuring in alliterative or rhyming phrases, such as rape and renne (late 14c.) "seize and plunder."

The older senses of the English word became obsolete. The surviving meaning "to abduct (a woman), ravish;" also "seduce (a man)" is clearly by early 15c. in English, but it might have been at least part of the sense in earlier uses.

Meaning "to rob, strip, plunder" (a place) is from 1721, a partial revival of the old sense. Uncertain connection to Low German and Dutch rapen in the same sense. In Middle English, and occasionally after, the verb was used in figurative senses of Latin rapere, such as "transport in ecstasy, carry off to heaven," usually in past-participle rapte, which tends to blend with rapt. Related: Raped; raping.

Classical Latin rapere was used for "sexually violate," but only rarely; the usual Latin word being stuprare "to defile, ravish, violate," which is related to stuprum (n.) "illicit sexual intercourse," literally "disgrace," stupere "to be stunned, stupefied" (see stupid). Latin raptus, past participle of rapere, used as a noun meant "a seizure, plundering, abduction," but in Medieval Latin also "forcible violation."

enrapt(adj.)

c. 1600, "carried away by (prophetic) ecstasy," from en- "make, put in" (see en- (1)) + rapt.

rapture(n.)

c. 1600, "act of carrying off" as prey or plunder, from rapt + -ure, or else from French rapture, from Medieval Latin raptura "seizure, rape, kidnapping," from Latin raptus "a carrying off, abduction, snatching away; rape" (see rapt). The earliest attested use in English is with women as objects and in 17c. it sometimes meant rape (v.), which word is a close relation to this one.

The sense of "spiritual ecstasy, state of mental transport or exaltation" is recorded by c. 1600 (raptures). The connecting notion is a sudden or violent taking and carrying away. The meaning "expression of exalted or passionate feeling" in words or music is from 1610s.

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