English
cess
Cess comes from Irish cís ‘tax, tribute, cess, rent’.
attested reconstructed ? uncertain or disputed deepest recorded ancestor
- 1 Wiktionary, English cess, which cites OED
- Earliest quotation in Wiktionary’s entry: 1595-1596, Edmund Spenser: “EUDOX[US] But what is that which you call Cess?…”.
Earlier history uncertain. See Wiktionary.
Lineage
- Irishc. 1200–presentcísWiktionary, English cess, which cites OED‘tax, tribute, cess, rent’
- Englishearliest quotation 1595-1596cessWiktionary, English cess, which cites OED. Earliest quotation in Wiktionary’s entry: 1595-1596, Edmund Spenser: “EUDOX[US] But what is that which you call Cess?…”
The story
For the first meaning below, the writings of Edmund Spenser, published 1633, point to a borrowing from Irish cís (‘tax, tribute, cess, rent’), likely from Latin census. Other senses: Uncertain.uncertain The source flags this step as uncertain. Occurs in print at least as early as 1831, when Samuel Lover used the expression as one already long-established. He unambiguously stated the derivation of cess in the malediction bad cess to be an abbreviation of success.
Linked words
through Latin census ‘census, a registering of the populace and…’
Today it means
noun An assessed tax, duty, or levy; billeting.
Sources
Sources: Wiktionary, “cess”. By Wiktionary contributors, CC BY-SA 4.0, via kaikki.org (dump of Oct 3 2026); text adapted and restructured. Language periods are conventional ranges, not dates for this word. License.
Etymograph / Irish cís / cess