simulateur

Forms

simulateur m (plural simulateurs, feminine simulatrice)^[1]

Etymology

It is borrowed from Latin simulātor (“one who imitates, one who feigns”), an imperial Latin noun formed on the supine of simulō (“to imitate, feign”), the source of simuler.^[2][3][4] The noun for the machine (1954) is very probably a borrowing of the English word simulator (1947).^[4]

Earliest recorded meaning

Its first sense, in 1274, was “counterfeiter”, and in the 14th century the Grandes Chroniques de France list faux scelleurs et composeurs et simulateurs, forgers of seals.^[2][4]

Semantic evolution

The sense “counterfeiter” went out of use.^[4] The general sense “one who feigns, who passes off as real what is not” is recorded from 1519, in tout ypocrite simulateur.^[2][4] The special sense of someone who feigns an illness to gain from it dates from 1845, first as a term of mental medicine,^[5][4] and Littré and Robin recorded it in pathology in 1858.^[2]

In the 1950s the masculine noun came to name a device that reproduces a real process artificially, in connection with simulation: simulateur analogique (1959) and simulateur de vol “flight simulator” (1960).^[2][4]

Timeline

• 1274 – First record, “counterfeiter”.^[2][5]
• 1519 – “One who feigns”, in tout ypocrite simulateur.^[2]
• 1611 – Cotgrave records the word.^[6]
• 1845 – Used of one who feigns illness.^[5][4]
• 1954 – The noun for a device that simulates a process appears.^[4][7]
• 1960 – Simulateur de vol in Le Figaro.^[2]

Meanings

Noun

1. A person who feigns a feeling or puts on a misleading attitude.^[7][3]
2. Especially, a person who pretends to be ill, for instance to avoid work: a malingerer.^[7][3][6]
3. (masculine) A device that reproduces a real process artificially: simulateur de vol “flight simulator”.^[7][2]

Related words

• simuler
• simulation
• simulacre
• dissimuler
• Latin simulātor

References

1. ^ a b Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i 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 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 g h i Rey, Alain, ed. (1992), Dictionnaire historique de la langue française, Paris: Le Robert
5. ^ a b c Bloch, Oscar; Wartburg, Walther von (1989), Dictionnaire étymologique de la langue française, 8th ed., Paris: Presses universitaires de France
6. ^ a b Littré, Émile (1873–1877), Dictionnaire de la langue française, 4 vols. and supplement, Paris: Hachette
7. ^ a b c d Rey-Debove, Josette; Rey, Alain, eds. (2007), Le Petit Robert de la langue française, Paris: Le Robert