Learn English – the story behind the phrase ‘as it were’? Where did it come from

catch-phrasesexpressionsidioms

This is a question my High School English teacher could not answer 20-odd years ago and every time I encounter it, it bugs me. I only know what it means in terms of other phrases such as 'per se'.

I have a general idea what it means, but I can't really wrap my head around it. 'As it were' when exactly?

Does anyone know the origin?

Best Answer

The form were is a past subjunctive, and it is used in a construction that is common in hypothetical situations:

He would kill me if he were able.

She behaves as [would be fitting / etc.] if she were upper class.

The phrase is theoretically short for as [it would be if] it were [so], though it is uncertain whether that is really where it came from.

The Oxford English Dictionary (2nd ed.) has its earliest quote from circa 1386:

As it were: as if it were so, if one might so put it, in some sort: a parenthetic phrase used to indicate that a word or statement is perhaps not formally exact though practically right.

  • c1386 Chaucer Nun's Pr. T. 26 She was as it were a maner deye.

  • 1399 Langl. P. Pl. C. ix. 22 Ich wolde a-saye som tyme for solas, as hit were.

  • 1531 Elyot Gov. (1834) 211 It draweth a man as it were by violence.

  • 1579 E. K. in Spenser's Sheph. Cal. Mar. 11 Gloss., The messenger, and as it were, the forerunner of springe.

  • 1692 E. Walker Epictetus' Mor. (1737) xxii, You're as it were the Actor of a Play.

  • 1711 Steele Spect. No. 32 31 She has thought fit, as it were, to mock herself.

  • 1881 Buchanan God & Man I. 124 She took him at once, as it were, into her confidence.

Related Topic