épervier

Forms

épervier m (plural éperviers)^[1] Old French esprever (about 1100), esparvier (late 11th century, in Rashi's glosses), espervier (about 1135), esprevier.^[2][3][4] The variant with ⟨-pr-⟩ was still listed by the Académie until 1740.^[4]

Etymology

It is inherited from Middle French esprevier, inherited from Old French espervier, borrowed from Frankish *sparwari (“sparrowhawk”).^{[2][4][5][1][6]} The Frankish word is reconstructed from Old High German sparwari and Middle Dutch sperware (modern German Sperber), and Late Latin had sparvarius in the 6th-century Salic law.^[2][4] The forms with ⟨-pr-⟩ arose by metathesis.^[4] Littré connects the Germanic word with the name of the sparrow, the English word sparrow and Sperling.^[7]

Cognate with Old Occitan esparvier and Italian sparviere;^[7] Bloch and Wartburg take the Italian word from Gallo-Romance.^[5]

Earliest recorded meaning

It is first found as esprever in the Chanson de Roland (about 1100), naming the sparrowhawk, in a comparison of speed: Plus est isnels qu'esprever ne arunde (“he is swifter than a sparrowhawk or a swallow”).^[2][7]

Semantic evolution

From the bird, by the idea of a sudden catch, the word came to mean in 1328 a conical fishing net thrown by hand;^[2][4][8] Littré explains that it takes fish as the hawk takes birds.^[7] From the 12th to the 16th century it was also a curtain hung like a tent round a bed.^[9] In 1676 it named the board on which a mason held his plaster, perhaps from the hawk sitting on the falconer's fist.^[4]

In the 20th century it became a political word (1966) for a partisan of a hard line, opposed to colombe “dove”, after the Anglo-American image;^[4][8] it also names a children's running game.^[3] The plant name épervière (1778) comes from the old belief that the plant strengthened the hawk's sight.^[4]

Timeline

• c. 1100 – Esprever appears in the Chanson de Roland.^[2]
• Late 11th century – Esparvier is found in Rashi's glosses.^[3][4]
• c. 1135 – Espervier in the Couronnement de Louis.^[2][4]
• 1328 – Esprevier names a fishing net in a royal ordinance.^[2]
• 1676 – It names a mason's plaster board.^[4]
• 1740 – The Académie last lists the variant with ⟨-pr-⟩.^[4]
• 1778 – Épervière is recorded for a plant.^[4]
• 1966 – It is used in politics for a hawk, as opposed to a dove.^[4]

Meanings

Noun

1. The sparrowhawk, a small, fast diurnal bird of prey, formerly trained for falconry.^[2][8][9]
2. (politics, figurative) A hawk, a partisan of a hard line.^[8][4]
3. A conical cast net weighted with lead, thrown by hand to catch fish: jeter l'épervier.^[2][8][9]
4. A children's game in which one player tries to stop the others from running across the playing area.^[3]

Word family

• épervière

Related words

• Old High German sparwari

References

1. ^ a b c Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j Trésor de la langue française informatisé (2004), ATILF – CNRS & Université de Lorraine, atilf.fr/tlfi; electronic version of Imbs, Paul; Quemada, Bernard, eds. (1971–1994), Trésor de la langue française, Paris: CNRS / Gallimard
3. ^ a b c d Guilbert, Louis; Lagane, René; Niobey, Georges, eds. (1971–1978; 1989), Grand Larousse de la langue française, Paris: Larousse
4. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p Rey, Alain, ed. (1992), Dictionnaire historique de la langue française, Paris: Le Robert
5. ^ a b Bloch, Oscar; Wartburg, Walther von (1989), Dictionnaire étymologique de la langue française, 8th ed., Paris: Presses universitaires de France
6. ^ Wartburg, Walther von, et al. (1922–2002), Französisches Etymologisches Wörterbuch, 25 vols., Bonn / Leipzig / Basel: Klopp / Teubner / Zbinden, p. 17, 171b
7. ^ a b c d Littré, Émile (1873–1877), Dictionnaire de la langue française, 4 vols. and supplement, Paris: Hachette
8. ^ a b c d e Rey-Debove, Josette; Rey, Alain, eds. (2007), Le Petit Robert de la langue française, Paris: Le Robert
9. ^ a b c Dictionnaire de français Larousse, larousse.fr/dictionnaires/francais (accessed 2024)