Etymologically
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pour

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Pronunciation

Forms

pour[1] Pro (842), Old French por (881) and pur (about 1050), pour from the 13th century.[2][3]

Etymology

It is inherited from Old French por, inherited from Late Latin pōr, from Latin prō (“before, in front of; for, on behalf of; instead of”) by metathesis of the “r”, perhaps helped by per (whence par).[2][4][1][5] Classical Latin already had a preverb “por-” of the same family, as in porrigō (“to stretch out”) and portendō (“to foretell”).[4][2] “Prō” meant “forward, in front of”; the idea of something left behind gave “in defence of, in favour of”, then the senses of cause, substitution (“instead of, as”) and proportion, and in Christian writers of the 3rd century that of purpose.[2][4]

The preposition exists only in northern France, the Iberian Peninsula (Spanish por, Portuguese por) and Logudorese Sardinian.[4] Italian and Old Occitan use Italian per instead.[4][2] As a preverb “pro-” has relatives in Italic, Celtic, Gothic 𐍆𐍂𐌰- (fra-) and Sanskrit प्र- (pra-), and as a preposition in Ancient Greek πρό (pró).[2]

Earliest recorded meaning

The Strasbourg Oaths (842) have Pro Deo amur “for the love of God”, where it means “out of regard for”.[6][3]

Semantic evolution

In the Sequence of Saint Eulalia (881) por o means “that is why”, and the 10th century has por qe “because”.[6] Cause is the oldest sense, both of a fact and of a person (pur tei “because of you”, about 1050).[6] The sense of destination and purpose, which Bloch and Wartburg describe as a Romance development, became the main one.[4] Pour + past infinitive of cause (pour avoir été censurée) is found in Molière (1664).[6]

Phrases include pour sûr (1665), pour de bon (1863) and pour de vrai (1876), the last replacing Wace's pur veir.[3]

Timeline

  • 842 – Pro in the Strasbourg Oaths.[6]
  • 881 – Por o “that is why” in the Sequence of Saint Eulalia.[6]
  • 937–952 – Por qe “because” in the Jonas fragment.[6]
  • c. 1050 – The form pur.[2]
  • 13th century – The spelling pour.[2][5]
  • 1665 – Pour sûr in La Fontaine.[3]

Meanings

Preposition

  1. for: meant for, intended for: un cadeau pour toi.[1][7]
  2. For, in favour of: voter pour un candidat.[1]
  3. For, towards: marks a destination: partir pour Rome.[1]
  4. To, in order to: with an infinitive, marks a purpose: travailler pour vivre.[1]
  5. Because of, for: marks a cause: puni pour avoir menti.[6][1]
  6. For, as regards, according to: pour moi, c'est faux.[1]
  7. Instead of, in exchange for: acheter pour dix euros.[3][5]

Noun

  1. Le pour et le contre: the arguments for and against.[1]

Word family

  • Latin prō

References

  1. ^ a b c d e f g h i j Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
  2. ^ a b c d e f g h Rey, Alain, ed. (1992), Dictionnaire historique de la langue française, Paris: Le Robert
  3. ^ a b c d e Guilbert, Louis; Lagane, René; Niobey, Georges, eds. (1971–1978; 1989), Grand Larousse de la langue française, Paris: Larousse
  4. ^ a b c d e f Bloch, Oscar; Wartburg, Walther von (1989), Dictionnaire étymologique de la langue française, 8th ed., Paris: Presses universitaires de France
  5. ^ a b c Rey, Alain, ed. (2005), Le Grand Robert de la langue française, electronic version, Paris: Le Robert
  6. ^ a b c d e f g h 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
  7. ^ Rey-Debove, Josette; Rey, Alain, eds. (2007), Le Petit Robert de la langue française, Paris: Le Robert