Pl. (rare) status. [a. L. status (u stem), f. sta- root of stāre to stand. Cf. the adopted form STATE sb.]
ǁ 1. Path. a. The height or acme of a disease: cf. STATE sb. 7 and STATION sb. 6. Now rare or Obs.
[1693. trans. Blancard’s Phys. Dict. (ed. 2), Status Morbi, see Acme.
(Cf. 1706. Phillips, Acme … among Physicians the height of a Disease.)]
transf. 1671. Evelyn, Lett. to Sir T. Clifford, 31 Aug., Diary & Corr. (1906), 646. The third and last period includes the status or height of the war … to the conclusion of it in the Treaty at Breda, 1667.
b. Used (with the sense ‘state, condition’) in many mod.L. combinations with adj., as status arthriticus, epilepticus, lymphaticus, nervosus: see Dorland’s Illustr. Med. Dict., 1913.
a. 1883. Fagge, Princ. & Pract. Med. (1886), I. 684. There is … a special modification of the disease in which the fits follow one another in rapid succession…. This has by modern French physicians been called the état de mal épileptique, and in England some writers have made use of the equivalent expression, status epilepticus.
1898. Syd. Soc. Lex., Status (L.),… A stage in which the disease having reached its height, it remains for a time before convalescence begins.
1899. Allbutt’s Syst. Med., VI. 323. Epilepsy with ‘status’ [i.e., status epilepticus] or complications.
1909. Daily Mail, 5 Aug., 5/6. The exact causation of the status lymphaticus was unknown.
2. Law. The legal standing or position of a person as determined by his membership of some class of persons legally enjoying certain rights or subject to certain limitations; condition in respect, e.g., of liberty or servitude, marriage or celibacy, infancy or majority.
1791. Boswell, Johnson, an. 1777 (1904), II. 156. To abolish a status, which in all ages God has sanctioned, and man has continued, would … be extreme cruelty to the African Savages.
1813. Edin. Rev., Oct. XXII. 24. The forfeiture of condition, or status, is a class of great extent theoretically speaking.
1832. Austin, Jurispr. (1869), I. Outline 41. The rights, duties, capacities, or incapacities, which determine a given person to any of these classes, constitute a condition or status which the person occupies, or with which the person is invested.
1865. H. W. Fisher, Consid. Amer. War, 84. Therefore his status as free or slave depended on the laws of Missouri, and by these laws he continues a slave.
1888. Bryce, Amer. Commw., I. xxiv. 351. But the majority of the court … delivered a variety of dicta on various other points touching the legal status of negroes.
1904. Tallentyre, Voltaire, II. xliii. 295. The man who for sixty years had not ceased to try to improve the civil status of actors.
1910. M. Gaster, in Encycl. Brit., XII. 40/1. The history of the legal status of the Gipsies … would form a remarkable chapter in the history of modern civilization.
attrib. 1910. Haddon, Races of Man, 61. The Mahrattas form the higher status group of this people.
b. transf.
1897. D. W. Forrest, Christ of Hist. & Exper., 442 Notes. I cannot follow Professor Bruce when he says that the status and the spirit of sonship ‘are not only distinguishable but separable.’
c. In application to things.
1914. Daily News, 6 Nov., 1. The Sultan of Turkey not having ratified the Convention relating to the status of enemy merchant vessels.
1914. Contemp. Rev., Dec., 729. The status of Egypt cannot continue what it now is amid the far-reaching changes which have radically altered the international situation during the past few weeks.
3. Position or standing in society, a profession, and the like.
1820. Scott, Monast., Introd. Ep. The shopkeeper … stood indeed pretty much at his ease behind his counter,… but still he enjoyed his status, as the Bailie calls it, upon condition of tumbling all the wares in his booth over and over, when any one chose to want a yard of muslin.
1848. Mill, Pol. Econ., I. 383. The status of a day labourer has no charm for infusing forethought, frugality or self-restraint into a people devoid of them.
1859. Lever, Dav. Dunn, iv. 35. On the one side he had … a sure status in society.
1873. C. M. Davies, Unorth. Lond. (1876), 60. As … the sect grew in social status as well as in numbers, gradually the miraculous tongues fell into silence.
1883. S. C. Hall, Retrospect, II. 248. As an actress, [she] took a professional status amongst the highest.
b. transf. of a thing.
1885. J. Martineau, Types Eth. Theory, I. I. II. ii. § 8. 201. Of this Ego, or soul, of ours,… how is it possible, after thus setting it up as a known separate entity, to cancel its status and hand over its contents to another subject?
1890. Hardwicke’s Science-Gossip, XXVI. 154. The medical status of ivory was based on its alkaline properties.
4. Condition of things.
1860. Maury, Phys. Geog. Sea, iv. § 236. Diligent, therefore, in their offices must the agents be which have been appointed to maintain the chemical status of the atmosphere.
1889. Anthony’s Photogr. Bull., II. Pref. The illustrations give a good idea of the present status of the art in the various methods of printing.
b. Finance. A particular grouping of the conditions bearing on the continuance of an annuity.
1838. De Morgan, Ess. Probab., 190. This status may be simple or complicated…. For instance, A is to enjoy an annuity to the end of his life, unless B should die before C, in which case it is to cease. This annuity will be enjoyed as long as either of the following status exist. A, B, and C all living. A and B living, and C dead. A living, and B and C dead, C having died first.
1862. Waterston, Man. Commerce, 303. Status of an Annuity, the state of things during the continuance of which the annuity is to be paid. A compound status is one which exists as long as either of two or more status remain.
c. Sc. Comm. Position (of a trader) in respect of solvency and credit. In quot. attrib.
1901. Scotsman, 8 March, 5/6. [Aberdeen] The status enquiries numbered 2054 during the year.
Hence Statusless a., without status.
1905. W. O’Brien, Recoll., ix. 186. The reporting profession was still in the statusless condition in which [etc.].
