rouvre

Forms

rouvre m (plural rouvres)^[1] Earlier forms: roure (1401, Orléanais), robre (1538), then rouvre (1552, Robert Estienne).^[2][3][4] The form roure is also found.^[4]

Etymology

It is inherited from Vulgar Latin *roborem, a masculine accusative that in popular speech replaced the classical neuter Latin rōbur (“hard oak, oak wood, strength”).^[3][5][6][7] Rey connects the Latin word with an Indo-European root also seen in the Latin colour words ruber (“red”) and rūfus (“red-haired”), and takes its ⟨o⟩ instead of the regular ⟨u⟩ as a sign of a dialect origin.^[3]

In the common language of northern France the word hardly survived, as the usual word for the oak there came from Gaulish (see chêne); but place names such as Rouvre(s) and Rouvray show that it was used across the langue d'oïl area in the early Middle Ages, perhaps for the sessile oak as distinct from the pedunculate oak.^[2][5][3] It lived on mainly in the south, where it is recorded in Occitan from 1180.^[2]

Cognate with Italian rovere, Occitan roure, Catalan roure, Spanish roble and Portuguese roble.^[8][5]

Earliest recorded meaning

The first record, roures in an Orléanais rent roll of 1401, already names the oak tree.^[2][9]

Semantic evolution

The word has kept its sense of a kind of oak; the phrase chêne rouvre is recorded in the Encyclopédie in 1753.^[2][3] Botanists now use it for the sessile oak, a tree of rather dry woods with stalked leaves and acorns without stalks.^[3][4] The Latin sense of hardness and strength did not pass to the French word but survives in the learned words robuste and corroborer.^[3][2]

Timeline

• 1401 – Roures appears in a rent roll of the Orléanais.^[2]
• 1538 – Robert Estienne writes robre.^[3][4]
• 1552 – The spelling rouvre appears in Estienne's dictionary.^[2]
• 1611 – Cotgrave records the derivative rouvraye.^[2][3]
• 1753 – The Encyclopédie uses chêne rouvre.^[2]

Meanings

Noun

1. The sessile oak (quercus sessiliflora), smaller than the common oak; also chêne rouvre.^[2][10][11]
2. Un bois de rouvres: a wood of sessile oaks.^[2]

Word family

• rouvraie

Related words

• robuste
• corroborer
• roboratif
• Latin rōbur

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 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 c d e f g h i Rey, Alain, ed. (1992), Dictionnaire historique de la langue française, Paris: Le Robert
4. ^ a b c d Guilbert, Louis; Lagane, René; Niobey, Georges, eds. (1971–1978; 1989), Grand Larousse de la langue française, Paris: Larousse
5. ^ a b c Bloch, Oscar; Wartburg, Walther von (1989), Dictionnaire étymologique de la langue française, 8th ed., Paris: Presses universitaires de France
6. ^ Rey, Alain, ed. (2005), Le Grand Robert de la langue française, electronic version, Paris: Le Robert
7. ^ Wartburg, Walther von, et al. (1922–2002), Französisches Etymologisches Wörterbuch, 25 vols., Bonn / Leipzig / Basel: Klopp / Teubner / Zbinden, p. 10, 433a
8. ^ Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter
9. ^ Dictionnaire du Moyen Français, version 2015 (DMF 2015), ATILF – CNRS & Université de Lorraine, atilf.fr/dmf
10. ^ Rey-Debove, Josette; Rey, Alain, eds. (2007), Le Petit Robert de la langue française, Paris: Le Robert
11. ^ Dictionnaire de français Larousse, larousse.fr/dictionnaires/francais (accessed 2024)