Etymologically
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grandir

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Pronunciation

  • IPA: /ɡʁɑ̃.diʁ/[1]

Forms

grandir[1]

Etymology

It is formed from French grand + -ir.[2][1][3] Littré instead derived it from Latin grandiō (“to make great”), and compares Old Occitan grandir and Italian grandire.[4]

Earliest recorded meaning

Adenet le Roi's Cléomades (about 1280) uses it intransitively for “to become bigger”: Adés aloit en grandissant la feste (“the feast kept growing”).[2][5] The Grand Robert and the Petit Robert date it about 1260,[3][6] and Bloch and Wartburg to the 11th century.[7]

Semantic evolution

The transitive sense “to make great” is in Georges Chastellain at the end of the 15th century, of a noble house that the duke had tant grandie.[2][4] The sense “to grow in intensity or importance” is in Chateaubriand (before 1848),[5] and the moral sense, to grow in wisdom or virtue, in Balzac (1830); grandir en sagesse is recorded by Littré in 1866.[5]

Timeline

  • c. 1280 – Intransitive grandir, in Adenet le Roi.[2]
  • Late 15th century – Transitive “to make great”, in Chastellain.[2]
  • 1694 – Recorded by the Académie.[2]
  • 1830 – Of moral growth, in Balzac.[5]
  • Before 1848 – “To grow in intensity”, in Chateaubriand.[5]

Meanings

Verb

  1. (intransitive) To grow, to get bigger or taller: Il a grandi de cinq centimètres.[6][1]
  2. (intransitive) To grow up.[1]
  3. (intransitive) To increase in intensity or importance: L'obscurité grandit.[6][5]
  4. (intransitive, figurative) To grow morally: grandir en sagesse.[6][5]
  5. (transitive) To make greater; to magnify, make look bigger or nobler.[1][2]
  • agrandir
  • agrandissement
  • grand
  • grandissant
  • grandeur

References

  1. ^ a b c d e f Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
  2. ^ a b c d e f g 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 Rey, Alain, ed. (2005), Le Grand Robert de la langue française, electronic version, Paris: Le Robert
  4. ^ a b Littré, Émile (1873–1877), Dictionnaire de la langue française, 4 vols. and supplement, Paris: Hachette
  5. ^ a b c d e f g Guilbert, Louis; Lagane, René; Niobey, Georges, eds. (1971–1978; 1989), Grand Larousse de la langue française, Paris: Larousse
  6. ^ a b c d Rey-Debove, Josette; Rey, Alain, eds. (2007), Le Petit Robert de la langue française, Paris: Le Robert
  7. ^ Bloch, Oscar; Wartburg, Walther von (1989), Dictionnaire étymologique de la langue française, 8th ed., Paris: Presses universitaires de France