Etymologically
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couleur

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Pronunciation

  • IPA: /ku.lœʁ/[1]

Forms

couleur f (plural couleurs)[1] Old French color, culur, couleur from about 1100.[2][3]

Etymology

It is inherited from Old French color, inherited from Latin color (“colour; complexion; outward appearance; specious argument”), from the accusative “colōrem”.[4][5][6][1][7] Rey and the Petit Robert connect the Latin word with cēlō (“to hide”) (compare celer): colour covers and hides the surface of a thing.[5][8] Latin already used it in rhetoric for the character of a style and, pejoratively, for a pretext, Bloch and Wartburg think the sense “pretext” was taken again from Latin, as in “sous couleur de” (“sub colore”).[5][6]

Cognate with Romanian culoare, Italian colore, Spanish color and Portuguese cor; it is feminine from French to Portuguese.[8][9]

Earliest recorded meaning

In the Life of Saint Alexis (about 1050) perdre sa color is used figuratively, “to lose its character”; the Chanson de Roland has li reis Marsiles ad la culur muée, “King Marsile has changed colour”.[4][3]

Semantic evolution

Of the face it is in the Chanson de Roland, gens de couleur, of people who are not white, is found in 1779 and 1790.[4][5][10] In the plural it named a person's livery (1393), the suits of playing cards (1694), liturgical colours (1732) and the national colours (Mirabeau, 1790).[4][5] By metonymy it meant a colouring substance, paint (about 1268).[4]

Painters' couleur locale (1699), the colour proper to each part of a picture, came to mean the characteristic features of a time or place in literature (1772).[4][5] The sense of a specious pretext (about 1280) survives in sous couleur de.[4][5] Couleur politique (1794, Chamfort) is the shade of an opinion, and en voir de toutes les couleurs (1866) “to have a hard time”.[4][5]

Timeline

  • c. 1050 – Color, Life of Saint Alexis.[4]
  • c. 1100 – Of the face, Chanson de Roland.[4]
  • c. 1268 – A colouring substance, Étienne Boileau.[4]
  • c. 1280 – A pretext, Couronnement de Renart.[4]
  • 1393 – A livery.[4]
  • 1694 – Suits of cards.[4]
  • 1699 – Couleur locale, in painting.[4]
  • 1790 – Couleurs nationales, Mirabeau.[4]

Meanings

Noun

  1. colour: the visual quality of light or of a surface: une couleur vive, de quelle couleur?.[8][1]
  2. A colouring substance, paint, dye: une boîte de couleurs.[4][8]
  3. Complexion: prendre des couleurs, to get some colour, de couleur, not white (of a person).[5][4]
  4. (plural) Colours, flag; livery: les couleurs nationales.[5]
  5. (card games) A suit, (poker) a flush.[1]
  6. Character, tone: couleur locale, couleur politique, annoncer la couleur, to lay one's cards on the table.[5][1]
  7. (literary) Sous couleur de: under the pretext of.[5]
  • colorer
  • coloris
  • incolore
  • Latin color

Usage notes

After a noun it is used as an invariable adjective: des écharpes couleur de feuillage, des gants couleur chair.[4]

References

  1. ^ a b c d e f Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
  2. ^ Rey, Alain, ed. (2005), Le Grand Robert de la langue française, electronic version, Paris: Le Robert
  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 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
  5. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l 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, 922a
  8. ^ a b c d Rey-Debove, Josette; Rey, Alain, eds. (2007), Le Petit Robert de la langue française, Paris: Le Robert
  9. ^ Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter
  10. ^ Quemada, Bernard, ed. (1959–2006), Datations et documents lexicographiques (Base historique du vocabulaire français, BHVF), Paris: Klincksieck / CNRS / Champion; ATILF