Etymologically
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bonheur

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Pronunciation

  • IPA: /bɔ.nœʁ/[1]

Forms

bonheur m (plural bonheurs)[1] Old French bon eür, bon oür, in two words, bon heur, bon-heur in the 16th century.[2][3]

Etymology

It is a compound from French bon + heur (“luck, fortune”).[3][4][5][2][1] heur, Old French “aür”, “eür”, is from Latin agurium (“omen”), an altered form of classical “augurium” “omen, augury”; with the decline of pagan beliefs it came to mean fortune, good or bad.[6][7] “Augurium” belongs to the family of augeō (“to increase”).[7] Bloch and Wartburg attribute part of the success of “bonheur” to the clash between “heur” and heure, from which “heur” took its “h”.[6]

Compare Occitan bonur.[1]

Earliest recorded meaning

Bon oür “happy fate, good fortune” is first found about 1121; the Châtelain de Coucy (12th century) writes joie d'amour, se bon eür m'i maine “the joy of love, if good luck leads me to it”.[3][7][2]

Semantic evolution

Littré notes that the etymology shows the original sense to be “good luck”, the sense close to “felicity” being secondary.[2] The old sense survives in porter bonheur, par bonheur, au petit bonheur and avoir le bonheur de.[5][8] From the 15th century it came to mean the state of a fully satisfied mind, happiness, now its main sense.[5][4] Meanwhile heur fell out of use after about 1660–70, surviving only in avoir l'heur de plaire, malheur was formed in the same way.[7][6] Ne pas connaître son bonheur is recorded in 1643.[9]

Timeline

  • c. 1121 – Bon oür “good fortune”.[3][7]
  • 15th century – “Happiness”.[5]
  • 1643 – Ne pas connaître son bonheur.[9]
  • c. 1660–70 – The simple heur goes out of use.[7]

Meanings

Noun

  1. happiness, bliss: le bonheur, faire le bonheur de quelqu'un.[5][1]
  2. A joy, a pleasure: quel bonheur de vous revoir![8]
  3. Good luck, good fortune: porter bonheur, par bonheur, luckily, au petit bonheur, at random.[5][1]
  4. (literary) Avec bonheur: successfully, felicitously, un bonheur d'expression.[5][4]

Word family

  • porte-bonheur

References

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