leontyne price

c.1225, pris, from O.Fr. pris "price, value, wages, reward," also "honor, praise, prize" (Fr. prix), from L.L. precium, from L. pretium "reward, prize, value, worth," from PIE *preti- "back," on notion of "recompense" (cf. Skt. aprata "without recompense, gratuitously," Gk. protei "toward, to, upon," Lett. pret "opposite," O.C.S. protivu "in opposition to, against"). Praise, price, and prize began to diverge in O.Fr., with praise emerging in M.E. by 1325 and prize being evident by late 1500s with the rise of the -z- spelling. Having shed the extra O.Fr. and M.E. senses, the word now again has the base sense of the L. original. The verb meaning "to set the price of" is attested from c.1382. Priceless (1593) logically ought to mean the same as worthless, but it doesn't. Price-tag is recorded from 1881. Pricey "expensive" first attested 1932.