bâtir

Forms

bâtir^[1] Old French bastir; the spelling bâtir dates from 1680 (Richelet).^[2][3]

Etymology

It is inherited from Old French bastir, most probably borrowed from Frankish *bastjan, a verb made on *basta (“hemp thread”), so first “to work hemp threads”.^[3][2][4][5] Wiktionary puts a Vulgar Latin *bastīre between the two.^[1] Bloch and Wartburg compare Old High German besten (“to lace”) and German Bast (“bast”),^[6] the TLFi bestan (“to mend”).^[3]

From the senses of sewing and weaving (Old Occitan bastir “to weave” is recorded about 1000) the verb is thought to have passed to building fences of stakes interwoven with brushwood, a Carolingian technique, then to fortifying, as Medieval Latin bastimentum (“fortified work, castle”), recorded in Provence about 1020, suggests, and finally to building.^[3][2][6] The TLFi and Rey find less likely the path “to weave” → “to make, compose” → “to build”, though it fits the order of the French records.^[3][2] Schuchardt separated the sewing verb, from the Germanic word, from the building verb, which he took from a Vulgar Latin *bastāre (“to suffice”);^[3][2][7] P. Guiraud proposed a late derivative of Latin basis (“base”); neither view has been followed.^[3][2][7] Littré, for his part, linked the building verb with bât and bâton.^[8]

The word is native only in France, Catalonia and northern Italy, the other Romance languages using the equivalent of construire;^[4][2] Bloch and Wartburg cite Italian imbastire (“to tack”).^[6]

Earliest recorded meaning

It is first found before 1105 in the Judaeo-French glosses of Rashi, as bastir “to sew with long stitches”.^[3][2][7] The sense “to compose, arrange” follows in the mid-12th century in the Pèlerinage de Charlemagne, and “to build” about 1265 in Philippe de Novare.^[3][4]

Semantic evolution

The sewing sense is rare in the 13th century; from it comes the modern “to tack the pieces of a garment before sewing” (1530, Palsgrave).^[3][2] In Old French the verb was used above all of abstract things, such as plotting a betrayal or arranging an affair: Littré quotes De traïson bastir from Berte and quelle avés bastie la traïson from the Chronique de Reims.^[8][3] Building in the literal sense is recorded twice in the 13th century but is rare before the 17th,^[3][2] while Bloch and Wartburg see it becoming the usual word from the 15th century.^[6]

Crafts adopted it by analogy: hat-making (1680, also bassetir), joinery (1701) and clockmaking (1752).^[3][2] Derivatives include bâtiment (1187 in a Judaeo-French text), bâtisseur (1539), bâtisse (1636) and bâti (about 1698).^[2][6]

Timeline

• before 1105 – Bastir “to sew with long stitches” in Rashi's glosses.^[3][7]
• mid-12th century – “To compose, arrange” in the Pèlerinage de Charlemagne.^[3]
• c. 1265 – “To build” in Philippe de Novare.^[3][4]
• 1530 – Palsgrave records “to tack the pieces of a garment”.^[3]
• 1539 – The derivative bâtisseur appears.^[6]
• 1680 – Richelet has the spelling bâtir and the hatter's sense.^[3]
• 1866 – Bâtissable is first recorded.^[3]

Meanings

Verb

1. To build or construct a building on the ground: bâtir un garage, terrain à bâtir.^[4][9][1]
2. Of birds, to build a nest.^[4][3]
3. (figurative) To build up, found or establish something: bâtir sa fortune, bâtir une théorie.^[4][1]
4. (sewing) To tack or baste: to join the pieces of a garment provisionally with long stitches.^[4][3]

Word family

• bâti
• bâtiment
• bâtisse
• bâtisseur
• débâtir
• rebâtir
• malbâti
• bâtissable

Related words

• bastide
• bastingage

Usage notes

Bâtir des châteaux en Espagne means to make plans that cannot come true, and bâtir sur le sable to found an undertaking on nothing solid.^[4][8] Littré treats the sewing verb as a separate headword, deriving it from Old High German bestan “to sew, patch”, while allowing that it may have merged with the building verb;^[8] the TLFi also gives it its own article but refers it to the same etymology,^[3] and the Petit Robert keeps both senses under one word.^[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 Rey, Alain, ed. (1992), Dictionnaire historique de la langue française, Paris: Le Robert
3. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s t u v 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
4. ^ a b c d e f g h i j Rey-Debove, Josette; Rey, Alain, eds. (2007), Le Petit Robert de la langue française, Paris: Le Robert
5. ^ Wartburg, Walther von, et al. (1922–2002), Französisches Etymologisches Wörterbuch, 25 vols., Bonn / Leipzig / Basel: Klopp / Teubner / Zbinden, p. 15/1, 75a
6. ^ 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
7. ^ a b c d Rey, Alain, ed. (2005), Le Grand Robert de la langue française, electronic version, Paris: Le Robert
8. ^ a b c d Littré, Émile (1873–1877), Dictionnaire de la langue française, 4 vols. and supplement, Paris: Hachette
9. ^ Dictionnaire de français Larousse, larousse.fr/dictionnaires/francais (accessed 2024)