poupée

Forms

poupée f (plural poupées)^[1] Old French popede (late 11th century), popee (about 1278), poupee (about 1360).^[2][3]

Etymology

It is from Vulgar Latin *puppa (“little girl, doll”), through an unattested Gallo-Romance descendant, with the suffix -ée.^[3][2][4][5] The Vulgar Latin form is an expressive variant, with a doubled consonant, of Latin pūpa (“little girl, doll”), a word of children's speech.^[2][3][4] The masculine pūpus and its variants remained rare and did not survive.^[2]

Rey thinks the Vulgar Latin word must also have meant “breast”, as the Romance languages show (Italian poppa), and that it gave a verb meaning “to suck”, as mamma meant both mother and breast.^[2] The Grand Robert and the Petit Robert take “teat, breast” as the starting point, whence “nipple” and “rag doll”, comparing pouper (“to suck”) and pompe.^[6][7] The TLFi notes a different explanation by J. Orr.^[3] Littré started from a reconstructed Latin participle, and cited Walloon popp.^[8]

Earliest recorded meaning

The first recorded sense, in the Gloses de Raschi at the end of the 11th century, is popede “a bundle of dressed flax”.^[3][2][6] Rey thinks the sense “doll”, from which this one came by likeness of shape, must be older; it is first found as popee in Jean de Meun's Roman de la Rose (about 1269–1278).^[2][3]

Semantic evolution

From the end of the 14th century the word was used, scornfully, of a childish or immature person, as in Froissart's celle poupée le duc d'Irlande;^[3][2][8] this use has aged, like the sense of a mannequin for showing hats and clothes (1396), now replaced by mannequin.^[2][3] From the early 16th century it meant a pretty, dressed-up, coquettish woman, and by 1640 any young woman, in familiar speech.^[2][3][4] In the 1950s the term of address poupée often translated American honey in the crime novels of the Série noire; it is condescending and sexist.^[2] Poupée à ressorts meant a prostitute in 1808.^[3]

Several technical senses go back to the shape of the first one: grafting en poupée (1600, Olivier de Serres), the part of a lathe that holds the work (1611), a dressing round an injured finger (1690), a figure used as a shooting target (1832), the pad that inks a copperplate in engraving (1895) and the inner part of a cigar (1900).^[3][2] Wiktionary connects English puppy and puppet with this French word.^[1]

Timeline

• Late 11th century – Popede “bundle of flax” in Rashi's glosses.^[3][2]
• c. 1269–1278 – Popee “doll” in Jean de Meun's Roman de la Rose.^[3][2]
• Late 14th century – Froissart uses it of a childish person.^[3][8]
• 1396 – Une poupee de lin, and poupées as dress mannequins for the Queen of England.^[3][8]
• Early 16th century – A pretty, coquettish woman.^[3][2]
• 1600 – Enter en poupée in grafting.^[3]
• 1611 – The part of a lathe.^[3][2]
• 1640 – Any young woman, in familiar speech (Oudin).^[4][2]
• 1690 – A bandage round a finger, in Furetière.^[3][2]
• 1895 – The inking pad of the engraver.^[3][2]
• 1950s – A term of address translating American honey.^[2]

Meanings

Noun

1. A doll, a small human figure used as a child's toy: une poupée de porcelaine.^[9][7][1]
2. Jouer à la poupée: to play with dolls.^[9]
3. Poupées russes: Russian nesting dolls, matryoshkas.^[9]
4. (familiar) A young woman or girl.^[9][1][2]
5. Poupée gonflable: an inflatable sex doll.^[9]
6. A finger wrapped in a bandage, or the bandage itself.^[9][3]
7. (technical) The headstock of a lathe, which holds the work.^[3][2]
8. (dated) A dressmaker's dummy for showing hats and clothes.^[2][3]
9. A bundle of flax or hemp for spinning.^[3][2][8]

Word family

• poupin
• poupette
• pépée

Related words

• poupard
• poupon
• pupille
• pompon
• Latin pūpa

References

1. ^ a b c d e 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 u v w x Rey, Alain, ed. (1992), Dictionnaire historique de la langue française, Paris: Le Robert
3. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s t u v w x 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
4. ^ a b c d Guilbert, Louis; Lagane, René; Niobey, Georges, eds. (1971–1978; 1989), Grand Larousse de la langue française, Paris: Larousse
5. ^ Wartburg, Walther von, et al. (1922–2002), Französisches Etymologisches Wörterbuch, 25 vols., Bonn / Leipzig / Basel: Klopp / Teubner / Zbinden, p. 9, 603a
6. ^ a b Rey, Alain, ed. (2005), Le Grand Robert de la langue française, electronic version, Paris: Le Robert
7. ^ a b Rey-Debove, Josette; Rey, Alain, eds. (2007), Le Petit Robert de la langue française, Paris: Le Robert
8. ^ a b c d e Littré, Émile (1873–1877), Dictionnaire de la langue française, 4 vols. and supplement, Paris: Hachette
9. ^ a b c d e f Dictionnaire Le Robert en ligne, dictionnaire.lerobert.com (accessed 2024)