ustensile

Forms

ustensile m (plural ustensiles)^[1] Middle French utensile (1351), utencille (1374), ustencile (1439), ustensille (1530) and ustensil (1540); the spelling ustensile is fixed in the 17th century (1639).^[2][3][4] The word was often feminine until the 17th or 18th century.^[5][6]

Etymology

It is inherited from Middle French utensile, borrowed from Latin ūtēnsilia (“things needed for use, utensils, furniture”), altered by an ⟨s⟩ added under the influence of user (and us, usage).^{[6][2][5][3][7]} The Latin word, a term of the spoken language, is the neuter plural of ūtēnsilis (“usable”), from ūtor (“to use”).^[6][2] The same Latin word gave outil by inheritance.^[2][6][5] Littré called the ⟨s⟩ quite barbarous, as the 16th century and some regional speech lacked it.^[8]

Earliest recorded meaning

It is first recorded as utensile in 1351, in charters from Liège, and in 1374 as utencilles in an ordinance on the Duke of Bourbon's finances, for all the objects of household use: table linen, kitchen vessels and the like.^[4][3][6]

Semantic evolution

The word first named any object of domestic use, especially in the kitchen, that worked without a mechanism.^[2] From the early 15th century it was also used, in the plural, for the tools of a trade, a use in which outil displaced it.^[6][2] The classical sense “object of use”, often feminine, has also gone.^[2]

In military language it named, from 1636, what householders had to supply to soldiers lodged with them, whence droit d'ustensile (1718).^[2][6] It had a figurative sense by the end of the 16th century, a bawdy sense from 1610, and in 19th-century slang it meant a pimp's mistress (1881).^[6][2] In Canadian French the plural is used for cutlery.^[2]

Timeline

• 1351 – Utensile in charters from Liège.^[4][2]
• 1374 – Utencilles for household objects.^[6]
• 1439 – The form ustencile appears.^[2][5][3]
• 1508 – It is used for the tools of a trade.^[2]
• 1610 – A bawdy sense in Béroalde de Verville.^[6]
• 1636 – Monet records the supplies due to lodged soldiers.^[6]
• 1639 – The spelling ustensile is fixed.^[2][3]
• 1881 – Rigaud records the slang sense “pimp's mistress”.^[6]

Meanings

Noun

1. A household utensil or object with no mechanism or only a simple one, especially for the kitchen: ustensiles de cuisine.^[9][1]
2. (dated) Everything needed in a house: furniture, tools and household objects.^[6]
3. (history, law) The supplies that inhabitants had to provide to troops lodged with them.^[6][8]
4. (Canada) In the plural, cutlery: knives, forks and spoons.^[2]

Related words

• outil
• user
• utile
• Latin utensilia

References

1. ^ a b c Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o Rey, Alain, ed. (1992), Dictionnaire historique de la langue française, Paris: Le Robert
3. ^ a b c d e Rey, Alain, ed. (2005), Le Grand Robert de la langue française, electronic version, Paris: Le Robert
4. ^ a b c Guilbert, Louis; Lagane, René; Niobey, Georges, eds. (1971–1978; 1989), Grand Larousse de la langue française, Paris: Larousse
5. ^ a b c d Bloch, Oscar; Wartburg, Walther von (1989), Dictionnaire étymologique de la langue française, 8th ed., Paris: Presses universitaires de France
6. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n 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
7. ^ Wartburg, Walther von, et al. (1922–2002), Französisches Etymologisches Wörterbuch, 25 vols., Bonn / Leipzig / Basel: Klopp / Teubner / Zbinden, p. 14, 87b
8. ^ a b Littré, Émile (1873–1877), Dictionnaire de la langue française, 4 vols. and supplement, Paris: Hachette
9. ^ Rey-Debove, Josette; Rey, Alain, eds. (2007), Le Petit Robert de la langue française, Paris: Le Robert