cabine

Forms

cabine f (plural cabines)^[1] Middle French cabain (masculine, 1530) in the nautical sense.^[2][3]

Etymology

The origin is disputed.^[2][4] In its modern senses the word is usually taken as borrowed from English cabin,^[3][5][1][6] which continues Middle English caban (1342), itself from cabane;^[2][3][6] it is thus a doublet of that word.^[1] Etymonline likewise calls the French word an English loan of the 18th century.^[6]

An older Picard cabine (“gaming house”) is recorded in an ordinance of Lille in 1364.^[2][7][4][5] Rey finds it hard to separate from that word and suggests that the native word passed into Middle English and came back to Picard in this form;^[2] he thinks an alteration of that word with the suffix -ine unlikely, and a Flemish source plausible but lacking a matching Dutch stem.^[2] Bloch and Wartburg place the word among the swindlers of the rich Flemish towns and note that the suffix was frequent in Dutch at that time, but leave the stem unexplained.^[7] The Grand Robert reports Guiraud's view that it is a Norman-Picard variant of cabenne, from a prefix ca- (“hollow”) and benne “basket”, then “hut”.^[5] Littré simply calls it another form of the same word.^[8]

Earliest recorded meaning

In the Lille ordinance of 1364 a cabine is a gaming house where cheats exploited the public's passion for gambling.^[7][2][4]

Semantic evolution

The old sense of a hut where people met to gamble was already archaic in the 18th century (1771), and its place was taken by the derivative cabinet.^[2]

The nautical sense, a small room on board a ship, first appears as cabain in 1530 and was long in competition with cabane;^[2][3] Rey derives it from Middle English caban.^[2][3] The form cabine in this sense is dated 1688 by the Grand Robert and 1759 (Richelet) by the GLLF and the Petit Robert.^[5][4][3] By analogy the word came to name other small closed spaces: the hut where bathers change (1866), the telephone booth (20th century).^[2][4] The aeronautical sense (1908) is an anglicism, and the sense “crew compartment of a spacecraft” (1962) an Americanism; it is now also used of the driver's compartment of lorries and other vehicles.^[2]

Timeline

• 1364 – A Lille ordinance uses Picard cabine for a gaming house.^[7][2][4]
• 1530 – Cabain names a small room on a ship.^[2][3]
• 1688 – Cabine is recorded in the nautical sense, according to the Grand Robert.^[5]
• 1759 – Richelet has the nautical sense.^[4][3]
• 1771 – The sense “gaming house” is archaic.^[2]
• 1866 – Larousse records the bathing cabin.^[4][2]
• 1908 – The aeronautical sense appears.^[2]
• 1962 – It is used of the crew compartment of a spacecraft.^[2]

Meanings

Noun

1. A small room or cabin on board a ship, for officers or passengers: Nous avions réservé une cabine sur le pont supérieur. “We had booked a cabin on the upper deck.”^[3][4][8]
2. A small room or enclosure for a set purpose: cabine d'ascenseur (a lift car), cabine d'essayage (a fitting room), cabine de bain (a bathers' changing hut), cabine téléphonique (a telephone booth), cabine de douche (a shower cubicle).^[3][4][9]
3. The part of a vehicle reserved for the driver or crew, as of a lorry or aircraft; also the habitable capsule of a spacecraft.^[3][4]

Word family

• cabinet

Related words

• cabane
• English cabin

References

1. ^ a b c d 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 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 Rey-Debove, Josette; Rey, Alain, eds. (2007), Le Petit Robert de la langue française, Paris: Le Robert
4. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k Guilbert, Louis; Lagane, René; Niobey, Georges, eds. (1971–1978; 1989), Grand Larousse de la langue française, Paris: Larousse
5. ^ a b c d e Rey, Alain, ed. (2005), Le Grand Robert de la langue française, electronic version, Paris: Le Robert
6. ^ a b c Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
7. ^ a b c d Bloch, Oscar; Wartburg, Walther von (1989), Dictionnaire étymologique de la langue française, 8th ed., Paris: Presses universitaires de France
8. ^ a b Littré, Émile (1873–1877), Dictionnaire de la langue française, 4 vols. and supplement, Paris: Hachette
9. ^ 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