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Bill W

Posted

"Pressure" originated in the late 14th century, deriving from the Old French pressure (anguish, oppression) and directly from the Latin pressura ("a pressing, a pressure"), which stems from pressus, the past participle of premere ("to press, hold fast, cover, crowd, compress").  Pressure combines the Latin stem press- (from premere) with the suffix -ure (indicating action or result).  
 
According to the Oxford English Dictionary (OED), the noun pressure was first used in English during the Middle English period  (1150—1500) with the original meaning referring to "suffering, anguish, or pressure on the mind/heart".  The OED's earliest recorded evidence for the noun pressure is from 1486 in the Boke of St. Albans.  The sense of "a constraining or oppressive kind" (e.g., "pressure of Consciences") dates back to an essay by Francis Bacon in 1625.  The use of "pressure" in a physics context (force per unit area) did not appear until the 1650s.  The verb pressure came much later, with the earliest OED evidence appearing in the 1910s (1911). 
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drpaladin

Posted

Pressure is a simple force, but it is life itself. 

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