Etymology
The term aggression comes from the Latin aggressio, meaning attack. The Latin was itself a joining of ad- and gradi-, which meant to step or to go. The first known use dates back to 1611, in the sense of an unprovoked attack. A psychological sense of 'hostile or destructive behavior' dates back to 1912, in an English translation of the writing of Sigmund Freud. Alfred Adler had theorized about an 'aggressive drive' in 1908. Child raising experts began to refer to aggression rather than anger from the 1930s.
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Famous quotes containing the word etymology:
“Semantically, taste is rich and confusing, its etymology as odd and interesting as that of “style.” But while style—deriving from the stylus or pointed rod which Roman scribes used to make marks on wax tablets—suggests activity, taste is more passive.... Etymologically, the word we use derives from the Old French, meaning touch or feel, a sense that is preserved in the current Italian word for a keyboard, tastiera.”
—Stephen Bayley, British historian, art critic. “Taste: The Story of an Idea,” Taste: The Secret Meaning of Things, Random House (1991)
“The universal principle of etymology in all languages: words are carried over from bodies and from the properties of bodies to express the things of the mind and spirit. The order of ideas must follow the order of things.”
—Giambattista Vico (1688–1744)