perform

This one begins as a bureaucrat's word, not an actor's. In medieval Anglo-French, parfornir meant something like “carry it all the way through,” and by about 1300 English had performen for contracts, duties, and other things you were supposed to get done. The theater sense is a later costume change, turning a plain old “finish the job” verb into the glittery language of stages and concerts around 1600. The twist is that the second half, fornir, is kin to furnish and even faintly to frame and form, while the little par- at the front carries the force of “through, completely,” like a seal pressed all the way down. So every time someone performs, the word is still whispering, “Don’t just start it—see it through.”