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Origin and history of bailiwick

bailiwick(n.)

mid-15c., "district of a bailiff, jurisdiction of a royal officer or under-sheriff," a contraction of baillifwik, from bailiff (q.v.) + Middle English wik, from Old English wic "village" (see wick (n.2)). The figurative sense of "one's natural or proper sphere" is by 1843.

also from mid-15c.

Entries linking to bailiwick

bailiff(n.)

c. 1300 (early 13c. in surnames), "subordinate administrative or judicial officer of the English crown, king's officer in a county, hundred, or other local district;" also "keeper of a royal castle;" also "minor judiciary officer under a sheriff," who serves writs, etc.; from Old French baillif (12c., nominative baillis) "administrative official, deputy," from Vulgar Latin *baiulivus "official in charge of a castle," from Latin baiulus "porter" (see bail (n.1)). From early 14c. as "agent of a lord, overseer of an estate" who directs operations, collects rents, etc.; also used in Middle English of an elected official in a town.

wick(n.2)

"dairy farm," now surviving, if at all, as a localism in East Anglia or Essex, it once was the common Old English wic "dwelling place, lodging, house, mansion, abode," which then came to mean "village, hamlet, town," and later "dairy farm" (as in Gatwick "Goat-farm"). It is common in this latter sense 13c.-14c.

The word is from a general Germanic borrowing from Latin vicus "group of dwellings, village; a block of houses, a street, a group of streets forming an administrative unit" (from PIE root *weik- (1) "clan"). Compare Old High German wih "village," German Weichbild "municipal area," Dutch wijk "quarter, district," Old Frisian wik, Old Saxon wic "village."

*weik-(1)

Proto-Indo-European root meaning "clan, social unit above the household."

It might form all or part of: antoecian; bailiwick; Brunswick; diocese; ecology; economy; ecumenical; metic; nasty; parish; parochial; vicinage; vicinity; viking; villa; village; villain; villanelle; -ville; villein; Warwickshire; wick (n.2) "dairy farm."

It might also be the source of: Sanskrit visah "house," vit "dwelling, house, settlement;" Avestan vis "house, village, clan;" Old Persian vitham "house, royal house;" Greek oikos "house;" Latin villa "country house, farm," vicus "village, group of houses;" Lithuanian viešpats "master of the house;" Old Church Slavonic visi "village;" Gothic weihs "village."

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