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roquette

Etymology and origin of the French word roquette

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French has two words spelled roquette: the salad plant, borrowed from Italian in the 16th century, and the rocket weapon, an old French word for a war rocket revived after English rocket.[1][2]

roquette1 salad plant

Confidence
Established
Formation
Borrowing
First attested
1505, roquete
Borrowed from
Italian rochetta
Ultimate origin
Latin (ērūca)

Pronunciation

  • IPA: /ʁɔ.kɛt/[3]

Forms

roquette f (plural roquettes)[3]

Etymology

The plant is borrowed from Italian rochetta (16th century), an old variant of ruchetta, diminutive of ruca,[1][4][5][6] from Latin ērūca (“caterpillar; rocket (the plant)”).[1][4] Rey explains that the hairy stem recalled a caterpillar, and that the Latin form was altered to “uruca”, “urica” under the influence of ūrō (“to burn”), from the plant's supposed aphrodisiac power;[4] the origin of “ērūca” is unknown.[4]

Earliest recorded meaning

Roquete is first found in 1505, in Desdier Christol's French version of Platina's cookery book;[1][2] Bloch and Wartburg and the GLLF date it to 1538 (Robert Estienne).[5][7]

Semantic evolution

Paré (16th century) writes Eruca, autrement dite roquette.[8] The plant was grown both as a salad and for its medicinal, antiscorbutic properties.[1][8] Since 1875 the word has also named a grey partridge thought to be a separate species, by a development that is not clear.[4][7] In the south-west of France the plant and the salad are called rouquette, from Occitan.[4]

Timeline

  • 1505 – Roquete in a translation of Platina.[1]
  • 1538 – Recorded by Robert Estienne.[7]
  • 1694 – Recorded by the Académie.[1]
  • 1875 – A kind of partridge.[4]

Meanings

Noun

  1. Rocket, arugula: a crucifer whose peppery leaves are eaten in salad; the salad itself.[2][9]
  2. A grey partridge with yellow legs.[10][7]

roquette2 rocket weapon

Confidence
Established
Formation
Borrowing
First attested
1561
Borrowed from
Italian rocchetta
Ultimate origin
Proto-Germanic (*rukkô)

Pronunciation

  • IPA: /ʁɔ.kɛt/[3]

Forms

roquette f (plural roquettes)[3]

Etymology

The weapon is the old French word “roquette” “war rocket” (1561), taken up again in 1950 after English rocket.[1][4][2] The old word is borrowed from Italian rocchetta (“rocket”) (14th century), a diminutive of rocca (“distaff”), named for its shape,[1][2] from a Germanic word for “distaff”,[1][2] which Wiktionary gives as Lombardic “rocko”, from Proto-Germanic *rukkô.[3] Rey takes the old word to be the feminine of “roquet”, a Picard form of rochet.[4] English “rocket” (1611) is either from the old French word or from Italian.[1][4]

Earliest recorded meaning

A gunnery book of 1561 has roquet(te) for an incendiary war rocket;[1] Trévoux (1752) records faire la roquette “to send up flares”.[1][7]

Semantic evolution

In the modern sense of a self-propelled, unguided projectile it is recorded in 1950 (Science et vie),[1] replacing the anglicism rocket (1949), which an order of 1976 condemned.[1][4] The TLFi corrects the date 1939 given by some dictionaries.[1] By metonymy it named the launcher (1953), now usually lance-roquettes.[1][4]

Timeline

  • 1561 – Roquette “war rocket”.[1]
  • 1752 – Faire la roquette in Trévoux.[1]
  • 1949 – The anglicism rocket.[1]
  • 1950 – Roquette “unguided missile”.[1]
  • 1953 – Lance-roquettes.[4]

Meanings

Noun

  1. A rocket: a self-propelled, unguided tactical projectile: roquette antichar.[2][1]
  2. (historical) An incendiary war rocket.[2][10]

Word family

  • lance-roquettes

References

  1. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s t u v 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
  2. ^ a b c d e f g h Rey-Debove, Josette; Rey, Alain, eds. (2007), Le Petit Robert de la langue française, Paris: Le Robert
  3. ^ a b c d e Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
  4. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m Rey, Alain, ed. (1992), Dictionnaire historique de la langue française, Paris: Le Robert
  5. ^ a b Bloch, Oscar; Wartburg, Walther von (1989), Dictionnaire étymologique de la langue française, 8th ed., Paris: Presses universitaires de France
  6. ^ Wartburg, Walther von, et al. (1922–2002), Französisches Etymologisches Wörterbuch, 25 vols., Bonn / Leipzig / Basel: Klopp / Teubner / Zbinden, p. 3, 242a
  7. ^ a b c d e Guilbert, Louis; Lagane, René; Niobey, Georges, eds. (1971–1978; 1989), Grand Larousse de la langue française, Paris: Larousse
  8. ^ a b Littré, Émile (1873–1877), Dictionnaire de la langue française, 4 vols. and supplement, Paris: Hachette
  9. ^ Dictionnaire Le Robert en ligne, dictionnaire.lerobert.com (accessed 2024)
  10. ^ a b Dictionnaire de français Larousse, larousse.fr/dictionnaires/francais (accessed 2024)

Related etymologies

Cite this entry

“Roquette.” Etymologically, 17 Oct. 2026, etymologically.com/fr/roquette. Accessed 17 Oct. 2026.

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