charogne

Forms

charogne f (plural charognes)^[1] Old French charuigne, charoigne and charongne.^[2][3] Picard carone and carongne.^[3]

Etymology

It is inherited from Old French charogne, inherited from Vulgar Latin *carōnia (“carcass”), probably a derivative of carō (“flesh”) the source of chair.^{[4][5][6][1][7][8]} Salvioni proposed instead a form *carionia, dissimilated from a derivative of cariēs (“rot”), but the TLFi and Rey find it hard to explain morphologically.^[4][5]

Cognate with Italian carogna, Old Occitan caronha and Spanish carroña, whose double ⟨rr⟩ Bloch and Wartburg call expressive.^[6][8] English carrion (early 13th century) comes from the Anglo-Norman form carogne.^[9]

Earliest recorded meaning

Philippe de Thaon's Bestiaire (1115–1130) uses it for the flesh of a corpse.^[4][5]

Semantic evolution

By metonymy the word named the rotting corpse of a person or animal: Benoît de Sainte-Maure's Roman de Troie (1154–1173) has Des charoignes ist la flairor “the stench comes from the carcasses”.^[4][5] It also named spoiled meat, far more pejorative than carne.^[5][4] Baudelaire brought it into poetry with his poem Une charogne.^[5][10]

As a coarse insult for a vile person it is found from 1606, according to Rey;^[5] the GLLF dates this sense to the Larousse of 1866, the FEW to 1867.^[11] The derivatives came late: charogneux (about 1500), charognerie (1861), charogner (1883) and charognard (1894).^[5]

Timeline

• 1115–1130 – Philippe de Thaon's Bestiaire has it for the flesh of a corpse.^[4]
• 1154–1173 – The Roman de Troie uses it for rotting corpses.^[4]
• c. 1170 – The Livre des Rois spells it charuigne.^[2]
• early 13th century – English borrows it as carione.^[9]
• 1606 – It is used as an insult.^[5]
• 1894 – The derivative charognard appears.^[5]

Meanings

Noun

1. The rotting body of a dead animal, carrion; also an abandoned human corpse.^[10][2]
2. Spoiled, half-rotten meat: Ce boucher nous a vendu de la charogne.^[4][2]
3. (familiar, insult) A vile, despicable person.^[10][2][1]

Word family

• charognard

Related words

• chair
• carne
• Latin carō
• English carrion

References

1. ^ a b c d Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e Guilbert, Louis; Lagane, René; Niobey, Georges, eds. (1971–1978; 1989), Grand Larousse de la langue française, Paris: Larousse
3. ^ a b Littré, Émile (1873–1877), Dictionnaire de la langue française, 4 vols. and supplement, Paris: Hachette
4. ^ a b c d e f g h 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
5. ^ a b c d e f g h i j Rey, Alain, ed. (1992), Dictionnaire historique de la langue française, Paris: Le Robert
6. ^ a b Bloch, Oscar; Wartburg, Walther von (1989), Dictionnaire étymologique de la langue française, 8th ed., Paris: Presses universitaires de France
7. ^ Wartburg, Walther von, et al. (1922–2002), Französisches Etymologisches Wörterbuch, 25 vols., Bonn / Leipzig / Basel: Klopp / Teubner / Zbinden, p. 2, 394b
8. ^ a b Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter
9. ^ a b Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
10. ^ a b c Rey-Debove, Josette; Rey, Alain, eds. (2007), Le Petit Robert de la langue française, Paris: Le Robert
11. ^ Quemada, Bernard, ed. (1959–2006), Datations et documents lexicographiques (Base historique du vocabulaire français, BHVF), Paris: Klincksieck / CNRS / Champion; ATILF