abîme

Forms

abîme m (plural abîmes)^[1] Old French abysme, abisme, bysme and bisme, and in the 14th century abesme and abime.^[2] The circumflex appears in Richelet's dictionary of 1680 but was settled only by the Académie in 1798.^[2] The spelling abyme was also used until the 20th century.^[3][4]

Etymology

It is inherited from Old French abisme, inherited from Vulgar Latin *abismus, an alteration of Christian Latin abyssus (“bottomless pit”),^[2][5][1][6] which is from Ancient Greek ἄβυσσος (ábussos, “bottomless”).^[5][7][3] Bloch and Wartburg call the word a borrowing, first found mainly in biblical texts.^[7] Rey analyses the Greek adjective as ἀ- (a-, “not”) and βυσσός (bussós, “bottom of the sea”).^[5][8] Old French also had abis “depth of hell”, taken directly from the Latin word.^[2]

The Romance forms point to an alteration of the Latin word, but its cause is disputed.^[2] Diez, Meyer-Lübke and Corominas explained it as a superlative *abyssissimus, shortened to *abissimus, which fits both the sense and the sounds, although the suffix was rarely added to nouns;^[2][8] Rohlfs suggested a blend with Latin īmus (“lowest”).^[2] The FEW and Bloch and Wartburg see the influence of learned words in -ismus, which the TLFi finds difficult because that suffix formed abstract nouns.^[2][7][5] A proposed influence of Old French altisme (“most high”) does not account for the Spanish form.^[2]

Cognate with Old Occitan abisme, Catalan abisme, Spanish abismo and Portuguese abismo, while Italian has abisso from the unaltered word.^[2][7] The noun abysse is a later borrowing of the same Latin word.^[1]

Earliest recorded meaning

It appears early in the 12th century in the Oxford Psalter, a translation of the Psalms: e des abysmes de terre derechief remenas mei, “and out of the depths of the earth you brought me back again”.^[2] There it means an unfathomable depth of the earth, and the same text uses it for the depths of the sea and figuratively for God's judgements.^[2]

Semantic evolution

In the Old Testament the word rendered the primeval chaos, the vast caverns where God gathered the waters and those waters themselves; in the New Testament it named hell, the abode of the damned.^[2] About 1170 Benoît de Sainte-Maure used it outside a religious text, for the winds of a storm rising d'abisme, “from the abyss”.^[2][8] About 1265 Philippe de Novare wrote that God's justice si est une abisme, “is an abyss”.^[2] Littré notes that the word was sometimes feminine in the 16th century.^[8]

From the 15th century it was used figuratively for an extreme degree of something (un abîme de…).^[5] Its heraldic use for the centre of the shield is recorded in 1671,^[5] and en abîme in Furetière in 1690.^[9] From the heraldic phrase Gide made mise en abyme (1893), restoring the etymological ⟨y⟩.^[5] The derived verb abîmer (14th century) at first meant “to throw into an abyss”, then (1567) “to damage”.^[7][5]

Timeline

• Early 12th century – The Oxford Psalter uses abysme for the depths of the earth and the sea.^[2]
• c. 1170 – Benoît de Sainte-Maure uses it outside a religious context.^[2]
• c. 1265 – Philippe de Novare calls God's justice une abisme.^[2]
• 14th century – The verb abîmer is derived from it.^[7][5]
• 15th century – First figurative use for an extreme degree.^[5]
• 1671 – First recorded as a term of heraldry.^[5]
• 1680 – Richelet spells it with a circumflex.^[2]
• 1798 – The Académie settles the spelling abîme.^[2]
• 1893 – Gide coins mise en abyme.^[5]

Meanings

Noun

1. (literary) A very deep natural chasm or gouffre whose bottom cannot be seen.^[4][10]
2. (religion) Hell, the depths of hell: les abîmes de l'enfer.^[4][8]
3. A wide gap or deep difference between people or things: un abîme sépare les deux frères.^[4][10]
4. (literary) Something unfathomable, such as time or the infinite.^[4]
5. Un abîme de: an extreme degree of a quality or state, as abîme de science, a person of immense learning.^[4][1]
6. (literary) Ruin, disaster, a desperate situation.^[10][8]
7. (heraldry) The centre of the escutcheon (also en abyme).^[1][5]

Word family

• abîmer

Related words

• abysse
• abyssal
• Latin abyssus

Usage notes

Gide's mise en abyme, from the heraldic phrase, names a work that reflects itself in miniature, such as a story within a story; it keeps the old spelling with ⟨y⟩.^[5][4]

References

1. ^ a b c d e f Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s t 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 Rey, Alain, ed. (2005), Le Grand Robert de la langue française, electronic version, Paris: Le Robert
4. ^ a b c d e f g Rey-Debove, Josette; Rey, Alain, eds. (2007), Le Petit Robert de la langue française, Paris: Le Robert
5. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n Rey, Alain, ed. (1992), Dictionnaire historique de la langue française, Paris: Le Robert
6. ^ Guilbert, Louis; Lagane, René; Niobey, Georges, eds. (1971–1978; 1989), Grand Larousse de la langue française, Paris: Larousse
7. ^ a b c d e f Bloch, Oscar; Wartburg, Walther von (1989), Dictionnaire étymologique de la langue française, 8th ed., Paris: Presses universitaires de France
8. ^ a b c d e f Littré, Émile (1873–1877), Dictionnaire de la langue française, 4 vols. and supplement, Paris: Hachette
9. ^ Quemada, Bernard, ed. (1959–2006), Datations et documents lexicographiques (Base historique du vocabulaire français, BHVF), Paris: Klincksieck / CNRS / Champion; ATILF
10. ^ a b c Dictionnaire de français Larousse, larousse.fr/dictionnaires/francais (accessed 2024)