Etymologically
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bateau

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Pronunciation

  • IPA: /ba.to/[1]

Forms

bateau m (plural bateaux)[1] Old French batel (to the 15th century); bateau from about 1220.[2][3]

Etymology

It is inherited from Old French batel, formed with the suffix -el on Anglo-Norman bat (“boat”) (1121–1122),[2][3][4][5][6] which, like Old Norse bátr, was taken from Old English bāt (891), the ancestor of English boat.[2][3][1] The suffix serves less to make a diminutive than to give the monosyllable more body.[2][4] The word displaced the native nef, from Latin nāvis.[1]

Guiraud proposed instead a stem meaning “old object”, as in Latin batillum;[5][7] Littré thought the word both Germanic and Celtic.[8] French passed it to Italian battello and Spanish batel.[4][9]

Earliest recorded meaning

Gaimar's Estoire des Engleis (1138) uses batel for a small craft used on rivers.[2][3]

Semantic evolution

From river craft the word became the general name of any floating vessel, though sailors use it chiefly for small ones.[3][7] Compounds include bateau à vapeur (1816), calqued on English steamboat, and bateau-mouche (1870).[3] Large, broad shoes were bateaux in slang (1841).[2][3]

Monter un bateau “to play a hoax” (1866, earlier pousser un bateau) is of uncertain origin and only influenced by this word.[5] From it the invariable adjective bateau means trite, hackneyed: un sujet bateau.[1][7]

Timeline

  • 891 – Old English bāt.[2]
  • 1121–1122 – Anglo-Norman bat.[2][3]
  • 1138 – Batel (Gaimar).[2][5]
  • c. 1220 – Bateau.[2][3]
  • 1816 – Bateau à vapeur.[3]
  • 1866 – Monter un bateau “to hoax”.[5]
  • 1870 – Bateau-mouche.[3]

Meanings

Noun

  1. A boat or ship: bateau à voiles, bateau de pêche.[7][1]
  2. Mener quelqu'un en bateau (familiar): to take someone for a ride, deceive them.[7]

Adjective

  1. (familiar, invariable) Hackneyed, trite: un sujet bateau.[1][7]

Word family

  • batelage
  • batelée
  • batelet
  • batelier
  • batellerie

Usage notes

Monter un bateau à quelqu'un “to hoax someone” is sometimes treated as a separate word, of uncertain origin, perhaps related to Old French baastel “conjuror's trick” (whence bateleur).[5]

References

  1. ^ a b c d e f g 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 e f g h i j k Rey, Alain, ed. (1992), Dictionnaire historique de la langue française, Paris: Le Robert
  4. ^ a b c Bloch, Oscar; Wartburg, Walther von (1989), Dictionnaire étymologique de la langue française, 8th ed., Paris: Presses universitaires de France
  5. ^ a b c d e f Rey, Alain, ed. (2005), Le Grand Robert de la langue française, electronic version, Paris: Le Robert
  6. ^ Wartburg, Walther von, et al. (1922–2002), Französisches Etymologisches Wörterbuch, 25 vols., Bonn / Leipzig / Basel: Klopp / Teubner / Zbinden, p. 15/1, 79b
  7. ^ a b c d e f Rey-Debove, Josette; Rey, Alain, eds. (2007), Le Petit Robert de la langue française, Paris: Le Robert
  8. ^ Littré, Émile (1873–1877), Dictionnaire de la langue française, 4 vols. and supplement, Paris: Hachette
  9. ^ Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter