stérile

Forms

stérile (plural stériles)^[1]

Etymology

It is borrowed from Latin sterilis (“barren, unfruitful, unprofitable”).^{[2][3][4][5][6]} Rey notes that the Latin word first described an animal without young, a sense that survives in conservative parts of the Gallo-Romance area, as in Franco-Provençal esterla (“goat that has not yet borne young”) (14th century).^[3] He compares words for a female animal without young such as Ancient Greek στεῖρα (steîra) and Middle High German sterke (“heifer”), and perhaps στερεός (stereós, “hard, solid”).^[3][7]

Earliest recorded meaning

It is first found in Nicole Oresme's translation of Aristotle's Ethics (1370–1372), meaning unable to bear young:^[2][3] Elle meisme estoit devenue sterile “she herself had become barren”.^[7]

Semantic evolution

Taken over in the Latin sense, it was said of a woman unable to conceive, and today of a man as well;^[3][7] une stérile “a barren woman” is found as a noun at the end of the 17th century.^[3][7] By analogy it was applied to a flower (1721) and by metonymy to a childless marriage (1750, Voltaire).^[3][2]

From the end of the 15th century it described unproductive nature: a tree that bears no fruit (1470) and barren soil (1490).^[3] The TLFi's first record of the soil sense is in Commynes, about 1500.^[2] Année stérile (1675) was a year of poor harvests,^[2][3] and in mining the word describes rock without workable ore, which the TLFi finds in 1807 and Rey in 1875–1876.^[2][3]

The figurative senses appear at the end of the 16th century: Montaigne writes of sciences steriles (1580), and Boileau applies it to what creates nothing and leads to nothing.^[2][3] In biology and then medicine it came to mean free of all germs (1891).^[2][3] The noun stérilité is older than the adjective (1332).^[4]

Timeline

• 1370–1372 – Oresme uses sterile of a woman unable to bear young.^[2][3]
• 1470 – Applied to a tree that bears no fruit.^[3]
• c. 1500 – Commynes uses it of infertile land.^[2]
• 1580 – Montaigne writes of sciences steriles.^[2][7]
• 1675 – Année stérile, a year of poor harvests.^[2][3]
• 1721 – Fleur stérile in the Dictionnaire de Trévoux.^[2][8]
• 1750 – Voltaire's hymen stérile, a childless marriage.^[2][3]
• 1807 – Filons stériles, veins without workable ore.^[2]
• 1891 – First used of a medium free of germs.^[2][9]

Meanings

Adjective

1. Of a living being: unable to reproduce; infertile.^[10][11][12]
2. (botany) Of a flower: unfit for fertilization.^[10][7]
3. Of land: producing no useful plants, barren; of a plant, bearing no fruit.^[10][11]
4. (mining) Of rock or ground: containing no workable ore.^[11][2]
5. (medicine) Free of all germs; sterile: des compresses stériles.^[10][12][2]
6. (figurative) Producing nothing, leading to no result; fruitless: une querelle stérile.^[10][11][2]

Noun

1. (mining) Barren rock or ground in a deposit.^[11]

Word family

• stérilement
• stérilet
• stériliser

Related words

• Latin sterilis

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 m n o p q r s 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 j k l m n o p Rey, Alain, ed. (1992), Dictionnaire historique de la langue française, Paris: Le Robert
4. ^ a b Bloch, Oscar; Wartburg, Walther von (1989), Dictionnaire étymologique de la langue française, 8th ed., Paris: Presses universitaires de France
5. ^ Rey, Alain, ed. (2005), Le Grand Robert de la langue française, electronic version, Paris: Le Robert
6. ^ Wartburg, Walther von, et al. (1922–2002), Französisches Etymologisches Wörterbuch, 25 vols., Bonn / Leipzig / Basel: Klopp / Teubner / Zbinden, p. 12, 258a
7. ^ a b c d e f Littré, Émile (1873–1877), Dictionnaire de la langue française, 4 vols. and supplement, Paris: Hachette
8. ^ Guilbert, Louis; Lagane, René; Niobey, Georges, eds. (1971–1978; 1989), Grand Larousse de la langue française, Paris: Larousse
9. ^ Quemada, Bernard, ed. (1959–2006), Datations et documents lexicographiques (Base historique du vocabulaire français, BHVF), Paris: Klincksieck / CNRS / Champion; ATILF
10. ^ a b c d e Rey-Debove, Josette; Rey, Alain, eds. (2007), Le Petit Robert de la langue française, Paris: Le Robert
11. ^ a b c d e Dictionnaire de français Larousse, larousse.fr/dictionnaires/francais (accessed 2024)
12. ^ a b Dictionnaire Le Robert en ligne, dictionnaire.lerobert.com (accessed 2024)