symbole

Forms

symbole m (plural symboles)^[1] Middle French simboles (late 14th century).^[2]

Etymology

It is borrowed from Latin symbolum (“token of identity, sign of recognition, creed”), the Christian Latin word for the creed, introduced about 1380 to gloss the Latin term.^[2][3][4] The Latin word is from Ancient Greek σύμβολον (súmbolon, “sign of recognition, token”), originally an object broken in two, each half kept by one of two hosts and handed down to their children, so that the matched halves proved a bond of hospitality.^[3][4] The Greek noun comes from συμβάλλω (sumbállō, “to throw together, join”), from σύν (sún, “with, together”) and βάλλω (bállō, “to throw”).^[3][5][6]

Classical Latin had symbolus (“sign of recognition”) and symbola (“share of the cost of a meal”).^[3][2] Old Occitan sembel kept the Greek sense “sign”.^[3]

Earliest recorded meaning

The first record, at the end of the 14th century in a Latin–French glossary, glosses simbolum as the formulary of the articles of the faith (credo) and as a share of a common cost (escot).^[2][3]

Semantic evolution

The word was used mostly from the 16th century, in le symbole des apôtres (1525) and absolutely for the creed (1611).^[2][3] In theology it took up the Greek sense of the outward sign of a sacrament (1541, Calvin).^[3][2] The sense that dominates today, a thing that calls up something abstract or absent, is from the middle of the 16th century (1552, Rabelais); from it came the figure standing for a deity, a country or an idea (1671) and the person who embodies something (1678).^[3]

A symbole is also a conventional sign standing for a thing or an operation (1674), a sense that spread in the 19th and 20th centuries: algebraic symbols (1751), chemical symbols (1803), mathematics, logic and computing.^[3][2] In rhetoric (1818) and literature it is an element open to a double reading, the basis of symbolisme.^[3][2] Saussure used it in linguistics in 1916, opposing it to the sign.^[2][7] English symbol comes from Late Latin, first as “creed” in the mid-15th century.^[8]

Timeline

• c. 1380 – Simboles glosses the Latin word for the creed.^[2][3]
• 1488 – La Mer des histoires explains it as a Greek word for “a piece, a portion”.^[9]
• 1525 – Le symbole des apostres in Berquin's translation of Erasmus.^[2]
• 1541 – Calvin uses it for what represents an abstract or absent reality.^[2]
• 1611 – Cotgrave records the sense “sign of recognition”.^[2]
• 1751 – Symboles algébriques in the Encyclopédie.^[2]
• 1803 – Chemical symbols, in Destutt de Tracy.^[2]
• 1830 – Vigny uses it of a person who embodies something.^[2]
• 1916 – Saussure's linguistic use.^[2]

Meanings

Noun

1. (Catholicism) A creed, a formula summing up the faith: le symbole des apôtres, le symbole de Nicée.^[7][2]
2. An object, image or fact that calls up something abstract or absent by association, an emblem: le lion est le symbole du courage.^[7]
3. (literature) An element of a text open to a double reading, literal and figurative.^[7]
4. A conventional sign standing for a thing or an operation: symbole chimique, symbole mathématique.^[7][2]
5. A person who embodies something in an exemplary way: elle est devenue le symbole de la résistance.^[7][2]

Word family

• symbolisme
• symbolique
• symboliser
• symboliste

Related words

• Latin symbolum
• Ancient Greek σύμβολον (súmbolon)
• English symbol

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 t 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 Rey, Alain, ed. (1992), Dictionnaire historique de la langue française, Paris: Le Robert
4. ^ a b Rey, Alain, ed. (2005), Le Grand Robert de la langue française, electronic version, Paris: Le Robert
5. ^ Littré, Émile (1873–1877), Dictionnaire de la langue française, 4 vols. and supplement, Paris: Hachette
6. ^ Guilbert, Louis; Lagane, René; Niobey, Georges, eds. (1971–1978; 1989), Grand Larousse de la langue française, Paris: Larousse
7. ^ a b c d e f Rey-Debove, Josette; Rey, Alain, eds. (2007), Le Petit Robert de la langue française, Paris: Le Robert
8. ^ Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
9. ^ Bloch, Oscar; Wartburg, Walther von (1989), Dictionnaire étymologique de la langue française, 8th ed., Paris: Presses universitaires de France