séculier

Forms

séculier (feminine séculière, masculine plural séculiers, feminine plural séculières)^[1] Old French seculer (about 1174), with the suffix changed to -ier in the early 13th century.^[2][3][4]

Etymology

It is inherited from Old French seculer with its suffix replaced by -ier in the early 13th century.^[2][3][5] The older form, recorded in Guernes de Pont-Sainte-Maxence's life of Thomas Becket (1174–76), is borrowed from Latin saeculāris (“of the age, worldly”), used by Church writers in the sense “profane”.^[2][4][1] The Latin adjective comes from saeculum (“age, century, the world”), the source of siècle; séculaire is a later borrowing of the same word.^[4][1][6]

Littré gives the cognates Old Occitan seglar, Spanish seglar and Italian secolare.^[7]

Earliest recorded meaning

It is first recorded about 1210 in the Bible of Guiot de Provins, in chanoinne seculier, of a canon who lives in the world rather than in a cloister.^[2][5]

Semantic evolution

The word first described a cleric who had taken no monastic vows and lived in the world, the opposite of régulier.^[3][2] From about 1260 it was applied to everything belonging to lay life as opposed to the Church, as when Jean de Meun wrote of a judge who was seculier ou … d'iglise, and it was used as a noun for a layman (1306).^[2][3][7] From the early 14th century it could also mean “worldly, profane”, as in seculieres vanitez.^[2]

The phrase bras séculier, the secular arm, is in Rabelais in 1546 (and as bras seculler at the end of the 15th century); bénéfice séculier dates from 1690.^[2][3]

Timeline

• 1174–76 – Guernes de Pont-Sainte-Maxence uses the older form seculer.^[2][3]
• c. 1210 – Guiot de Provins writes chanoinne seculier.^[2]
• c. 1260 – It is applied to lay life as opposed to the Church.^[3][5]
• 1306 – Guillaume Guiart uses les seculiers as a noun.^[2]
• 1546 – Rabelais uses bras seculier.^[2][3]
• 1690 – Bénéfice séculier is recorded.^[3]

Meanings

Adjective

1. Belonging to lay life, temporal rather than ecclesiastical: les tribunaux séculiers, le bras séculier.^[8][9][2]
2. Of clergy, living in the world rather than under the rule of an order; secular, as opposed to régulier: le clergé séculier.^[8][2][7]
3. (dated) Worldly, profane.^[2][7]

Noun

1. A secular priest; also, a layman.^[10][8][7]

Word family

• séculièrement

Related words

• siècle
• séculaire
• séculariser
• sécularité
• Latin saeculāris

References

1. ^ a b c d Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o 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 Rey, Alain, ed. (2005), Le Grand Robert de la langue française, electronic version, Paris: Le Robert
5. ^ a b c Guilbert, Louis; Lagane, René; Niobey, Georges, eds. (1971–1978; 1989), Grand Larousse de la langue française, Paris: Larousse
6. ^ Wartburg, Walther von, et al. (1922–2002), Französisches Etymologisches Wörterbuch, 25 vols., Bonn / Leipzig / Basel: Klopp / Teubner / Zbinden, p. 11, 45a
7. ^ a b c d e Littré, Émile (1873–1877), Dictionnaire de la langue française, 4 vols. and supplement, Paris: Hachette
8. ^ a b c Rey-Debove, Josette; Rey, Alain, eds. (2007), Le Petit Robert de la langue française, Paris: Le Robert
9. ^ Dictionnaire Le Robert en ligne, dictionnaire.lerobert.com (accessed 2024)
10. ^ Dictionnaire de français Larousse, larousse.fr/dictionnaires/francais (accessed 2024)