mid-15c., impurite, "thing which makes or is impure;" c. 1500, "fact or quality of being impure," from Latin impuritas "uncleanness" (in a moral sense), from impurus "not pure" (see impure). Related: Impurities.
1785, "neat, smart, tidy," originally slang, perhaps an altered form of 16c. nettie "neat, natty," from Middle English net "pure, fine, elegant" (see neat (adj.)). Related: Nattily; nattiness.
"to draw off (wine, etc.) from the lees; draw off, as pure liquor, from sediment," late 15c., rakken, from Old French raquer, rëechier, rëequier which is of uncertain origin. Related: Racked, racking.
1530s, "pure, unmixed," from French sincere (16c.), from Latin sincerus, of things, "whole, clean, pure, uninjured, unmixed," figuratively "sound, genuine, pure, true, candid, truthful," of uncertain origin. The ground sense seems to be "that which is not falsified." Meaning "free from pretense or falsehood" in English is from 1530s.
There has been a temptation to see the first element as Latin sine "without." But there is no etymological justification for the common story that the word means "without wax" (*sin cerae), which is dismissed out of hand by OED and others, and the stories invented to justify that folk etymology are even less plausible. Watkins has it as originally "of one growth" (i.e. "not hybrid, unmixed"), from PIE *sm-ke-ro-, from *sem- "one" (see same) + root of crescere "to grow" (from PIE root *ker- (2) "to grow"). De Vaan finds plausible a source in a lost adjective *caerus "whole, intact," from a PIE root meaning "whole."
St. Agnes, martyred 303 C.E., is patron saint of young girls, hence the folk connection of St. Agnes' Eve (Jan. 20-21) with love divinations. In Middle English, frequently written phonetically as Annis, Annys. In U.S., among the top 50 names for girls born between 1887 and 1919.
"to inflict pain upon to punish and recall to duty, to punish for the purpose of correcting or reclaiming," c. 1300, chastisen, from Old French chastiier "to warn, advise, instruct; chastise, admonish; punish; dominate, tame" (12c., Modern French châtier), from Latin castigare "to set or keep right, to reprove, chasten, to punish," literally "to make pure" (see castigate). Or perhaps from Middle English chastien (see chasten) + -ise, though this would be early for such a native formation. The form of the modern word "is not easily accounted for" [OED]. Related: Chastised; chastising.
He alone may chastise who loves. [Rabindranath Tagore, "The Crescent Moon," 1913]
