poète

Forms

poète m or f by sense (plural poètes, feminine poétesse or poètesse)^[1] Old French poete;^[2][3] poëte was usual in the 16th to 18th centuries.^[2][3]

Etymology

It is borrowed from Latin poēta (“poet”),^[2][4][5][1] which is from Ancient Greek ποιητής (poiētḗs, “maker, author, poet”),^[1][2][6] from ποιέω (poiéō, “to make, create”).^[6][4] The Greek noun meant an author or creator, a maker or craftsman, and in particular one who composed verse, and by extension prose works, speeches and music.^[2][4]

Earliest recorded meaning

The first record, about 1150 in Everard de Kirkham's Distiques de Caton, has it for a writer of poetry.^[2][4]

Semantic evolution

In the vocabulary of the liberal arts it named a canonical author taken as a model of poetic expression (Wace, about 1155), and about 1160 Benoît de Sainte-Maure used it of a learned and wise man of Greek or Roman antiquity credited with extraordinary intellectual powers.^[6] It was used as an adjective from 1547.^[2][4]

Well before poème did, it took the figurative sense “dreamer, odd or slightly crazy person”: Rabelais has folz comme poëtes, et resveurs comme philosophes (1546).^[2][4] It came to mean a person whose works are full of poetry (1661) and one gifted for poetry (Boileau, 1669–1673).^[2][4] Romanticism spread it outside the arts to anyone showing great creative power.^[4]

Of a woman, une poète is found in 1723, before usage returned to the masculine (Stendhal, 1817), poétesse being felt as marked.^[2][4] Poète maudit comes from Verlaine's Les Poètes maudits (1884).^[6][7]

Timeline

• c. 1150 – First record, in Everard de Kirkham's Distiques de Caton.^[2][4]
• c. 1160 – Benoît de Sainte-Maure uses it of an ancient sage.^[6]
• 1546 – Rabelais uses it for a dreamer or crank.^[2][4]
• 1547 – First used as an adjective.^[2][4]
• 1550 – The derivative poétastre in Ronsard.^[2]
• 1661 – Used of a person whose works are full of poetry.^[2][4]
• 1723 – Une poète used of a woman.^[2][4]
• 1884 – Verlaine's Les Poètes maudits.^[6]

Meanings

Noun

1. A poet, a writer who composes poetry.^[7][2]
2. An author whose work, in prose or another art, is full of poetry.^[7][2]
3. A person with a poetic sensibility; a dreamer.^[7][2][1]
4. Œillet de poète: the sweet william.^[7][1]

Adjective

1. Having the gifts of a poet: Elle était poète à ses heures.^[7][2]

Word family

• poétesse
• poétiser
• poétastre
• poétaillon
• œillet de poète

Related words

• poème
• poésie
• poétique
• Latin poēta
• Ancient Greek ποιητής (poiētḗs)

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 t 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 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 Rey, Alain, ed. (1992), Dictionnaire historique de la langue française, Paris: Le Robert
5. ^ Rey, Alain, ed. (2005), Le Grand Robert de la langue française, electronic version, Paris: Le Robert
6. ^ a b c d e f Guilbert, Louis; Lagane, René; Niobey, Georges, eds. (1971–1978; 1989), Grand Larousse de la langue française, Paris: Larousse
7. ^ a b c d e f Rey-Debove, Josette; Rey, Alain, eds. (2007), Le Petit Robert de la langue française, Paris: Le Robert