manor

\ \ [13] Etymologically, a manor is a place where one ‘stays’ or ‘dwells’. It goes back ultimately to the Latin verb manēre ‘remain, stay’, which in post-classical times was used for ‘dwell, live’. Its Old French descendant maneir came to be used as a noun, meaning ‘dwelling place’. This passed into English via Anglo- Norman maner, and was originally used for ‘country house’. In the 14th century it came to be incorporated into the terminology of the feudal system, from which its present-day meanings come.

\ \ The past participle stem of manēre was māns-, from which was derived the Latin noun mānsiō ‘place to stay’. Old French took this over in two forms: maison (whence the modern French word for ‘house’, source of English maisonette [19]) and mansion. English borrowed this as mansion [14], and originally used it for ‘place of abode, house’. The present-day connotations of a ‘large stately house’ did not emerge until as recently as the 19th century. Manse [15] comes from the same ultimate source, as do menagerie [18] (whose immediate French source originally denoted the ‘management of domestic animals’), permanent, and remain.

\ \ Cf.⇒ MAISONETTE, MANSE, MANSION, MENAGERIE, PERMANENT, REMAIN