Someone else may have better wisdom on its evolution as a grammatical 
term, but my Oxford Dict. of English Etymology gives the meaning 'in a 
complete state' for the 13th century and the first use as a grammatical 
term for a 'tense' in the 16th C. ('perfect' isn't a tense, but an 
aspect. "The perfect tenses" express aspect as well as tense).

The dictionary cites Middle English 'parfit' (with long -i- or with 
-igh-type spellings), coming from Old French 'parfit', which changed in 
the 15th C. to 'parfet', and "by assimilation to Latin", acc. to the 
dict., became 'perfect' in the 15th C. This closely resembles the Latin 
etymon for the Old French word, Latin 'perfectu-s', past part. of 
'perficere', 'to complete, to accomplish'. Such 'assimilations' -- 
restoring of a Latin spelling/pronunciation of words that came into the 
language from French -- happened with other words as well, such as 'doubt'.

It's easy to see how one could get from 'finished' to 'flawless'. An 
expression like 'I haven't perfected it yet' or 'it is not yet perfect', 
  in the mouth of a finicky person, could easily mean either!


~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Johanna Rubba   Associate Professor, Linguistics
English Department, California Polytechnic State University
One Grand Avenue  • San Luis Obispo, CA 93407
Tel. (805)-756-2184  •  Fax: (805)-756-6374 • Dept. Phone.  756-2596
• E-mail: [log in to unmask] •      Home page: 
http://www.cla.calpoly.edu/~jrubba
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

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