chambre

Pronunciation

• IPA: /ʃɑ̃bʁ/^[1]

Forms

chambre f (plural chambres)^[1] Old French cambra, cambre (mid-11th century), chambre (12th century); Picard cambe, cambre.^[2][3][4]

Etymology

It is inherited from Old French chambre, inherited from Latin camera (“vaulted roof; room”), borrowed from Ancient Greek καμάρα (kamára, “vault; covered place”), a technical word of obscure origin.^{[2][3][5][6][1]} The Latin word first meant a vaulted ceiling; in Late Latin (Cassiodorus) it meant a room, especially a bedroom, a development also found in Greek, and in Medieval Latin (1191) the place where judges sit.^[2][3][5]

Cognate with Italian camera, Occitan cambra, Catalan cambra, Spanish cámara and German Kammer; caméra is a doublet borrowed through English.^[7][1]

Earliest recorded meaning

In the mid-11th century the Vie de saint Alexis uses cambra for a room, especially the room where one sleeps.^[2][3]

Semantic evolution

Under the Ancien Régime la Chambre was the king's bedchamber, whence la musique de la chambre (1690) and musique de chambre (1855).^[2][3] Travailler en chambre, of a craftsman working at home, dates from 1303, and valet de chambre from 1669.^[2] In Switzerland, Belgium and Quebec chambre can still name other rooms of a house.^[3]

From 1388 the word named a section of a court, whence chambre de justice (1680), and later assemblies: Chambre des communes (1789), Chambre des députés (1814), chambre de commerce (1631).^[2][3] It also came to mean an enclosed space or cavity: the chamber of a gun (1414), chambre noire in optics, the chambers of the eye (Descartes, 1637) and the inner tube of a tyre (chambre à air, Michelin, 1891).^[2][8]

Timeline

• Mid-11th century – Cambra in the Vie de saint Alexis.^[2]
• 1303 – En chambre, of a craftsman working at home.^[2]
• 1388 – A chamber of a court, in Picard.^[2]
• 1414 – The chamber of a gun.^[2]
• 1631 – Chambre de commerce.^[2]
• 1637 – Chambre de l'œil in Descartes.^[2]
• 1814 – Chambre des députés.^[2]
• 1891 – Chambre à air.^[2]

Meanings

Noun

1. A bedroom: chambre à coucher, chambre d'amis; a hotel room.^[7][1]
2. (dated, regional) A room of a house.^[7][3]
3. A legislative or judicial chamber: la Chambre des députés.^[1][2]
4. A professional body: chambre de commerce.^[9]
5. An enclosed space or cavity: chambre froide, chambre à air, chambre noire.^[2][9]
6. Musique de chambre: chamber music.^[2]

Word family

• arrière-chambre
• chambrée
• chambrette
• chambrer
• chambrière

Related words

• antichambre
• camarade
• caméra
• Latin camera

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 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 Rey, Alain, ed. (1992), Dictionnaire historique de la langue française, Paris: Le Robert
4. ^ Littré, Émile (1873–1877), Dictionnaire de la langue française, 4 vols. and supplement, Paris: Hachette
5. ^ a b Bloch, Oscar; Wartburg, Walther von (1989), Dictionnaire étymologique de la langue française, 8th ed., Paris: Presses universitaires de France
6. ^ Wartburg, Walther von, et al. (1922–2002), Französisches Etymologisches Wörterbuch, 25 vols., Bonn / Leipzig / Basel: Klopp / Teubner / Zbinden, p. 2, 130a
7. ^ a b c Rey-Debove, Josette; Rey, Alain, eds. (2007), Le Petit Robert de la langue française, Paris: Le Robert
8. ^ Guilbert, Louis; Lagane, René; Niobey, Georges, eds. (1971–1978; 1989), Grand Larousse de la langue française, Paris: Larousse
9. ^ a b Dictionnaire de français Larousse, larousse.fr/dictionnaires/francais (accessed 2024)