horloge

Forms

horloge f (plural horloges)^[1] Old French oriloge, orloge and reloge, at first masculine; the spelling with ⟨h⟩, remade after the Latin, dates from the 15th century.^[2][3]

Etymology

It is inherited from Old French oriloge, inherited from Latin hōrologium (“sundial, water clock”).^[4][5][2] Bloch and Wartburg class it instead as a borrowing from the Latin word.^[6] The Latin word is from Ancient Greek ὡρολόγιον (hōrológion), literally “what tells the hour”, a name for instruments such as the sundial and the water clock.^[4][2] The Greek word is formed from ὥρα (hṓra, “hour, season”) and a derivative of λέγω (légō, “to say”).^[2][3][7]

The word was masculine in Old French; the feminine appeared in the 13th century and prevailed in the general language only in the 17th, while the masculine survives in some dialects.^[4][2] Berry and Burgundy have reloge, masculine.^[8]

Cognate with Italian orologio, Occitan relotge and Catalan rellotge, from which Spanish reloj was borrowed.^[9]

Earliest recorded meaning

The first record, oriloge in the Livre des Rois (about 1170), names a device that shows the hour, there by the sun: “e il i out uns oriloges par unt l'um veist cume l'ure del jur veneit” (“and there was a dial by which one could see how the hour of the day went”).^[4][8]

Semantic evolution

At first the word kept its Latin sense of any device showing the hour, such as the sundial, the water clock or the hourglass, a use now historical.^[2][4] About 1230 it named a mechanism that announces the hour by a sound, the striking clock, which gave une heure d'horloge “a full hour” (1547).^[4][2] From the 15th century it was used by analogy of whatever regulates something, the source of phrases such as être réglé comme une horloge “to be as regular as clockwork”.^[4][2]

In the 18th century botanists adopted it: horloge de Flore (1797) is a list of plants arranged by the hour their flowers open and close, and horloge de la mort (1776) is an insect that ticks as it gnaws wood.^[2] After 1965 new precision instruments were named horloge à quartz, horloge électronique and horloge atomique.^[2][7] In computing the word names the component that sends the periodic signals that synchronise a processor.^[10][11]

Timeline

• c. 1170 – Oriloge appears in the Livre des Rois for a sun dial.^[4]
• c. 1170–1180 – The form orloge is recorded in Guillaume de Saint-Pair.^[4]
• 13th century – The feminine gender appears.^[4][2]
• c. 1230 – Gerbert de Montreuil uses it of a striking clock.^[4]
• 15th century – The spelling horloge is found, and the figurative sense “what regulates something”.^[4]
• 1547 – Une heure d'horloge “a full hour” in Noël du Fail.^[4]
• 17th century – The feminine becomes the norm.^[4][2]
• 1797 – Horloge de Flore is recorded.^[2]
• 1962 – Larousse records horloge atomique.^[7]

Meanings

Noun

1. A clock, especially a large one fixed on a building or in a public place, often with a chime: L'horloge de la gare sonne neuf heures.^[4][11]
2. (dated) Any device that shows the time, such as a sundial (horloge solaire) or a water clock (horloge à eau).^[10][8]
3. Horloge atomique, horloge à quartz: high-precision timekeepers regulated by atoms or a quartz crystal.^[10]
4. (computing) The signal generator that synchronises a microprocessor.^[10][11]
5. Être réglé comme une horloge: to be extremely regular in one's habits.^[11][2]

Word family

• horloger
• horlogerie

Related words

• heure
• Latin hōrologium

Usage notes

The old masculine, still used by Stendhal and Hugo, survives in a few names such as le gros horloge at Rouen.^[2]

References

1. ^ a b Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o Rey, Alain, ed. (1992), Dictionnaire historique de la langue française, Paris: Le Robert
3. ^ a b Rey, Alain, ed. (2005), Le Grand Robert de la langue française, electronic version, Paris: Le Robert
4. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o 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. ^ Wartburg, Walther von, et al. (1922–2002), Französisches Etymologisches Wörterbuch, 25 vols., Bonn / Leipzig / Basel: Klopp / Teubner / Zbinden, p. 4, 483a
6. ^ Bloch, Oscar; Wartburg, Walther von (1989), Dictionnaire étymologique de la langue française, 8th ed., Paris: Presses universitaires de France
7. ^ a b c Guilbert, Louis; Lagane, René; Niobey, Georges, eds. (1971–1978; 1989), Grand Larousse de la langue française, Paris: Larousse
8. ^ a b c Littré, Émile (1873–1877), Dictionnaire de la langue française, 4 vols. and supplement, Paris: Hachette
9. ^ Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter
10. ^ a b c d Rey-Debove, Josette; Rey, Alain, eds. (2007), Le Petit Robert de la langue française, Paris: Le Robert
11. ^ a b c d Dictionnaire de français Larousse, larousse.fr/dictionnaires/francais (accessed 2024)