Etymologically
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ville

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Pronunciation

  • IPA: /vil/[1]
  • IPA (Canada): /vɪl/[1]

Forms

ville f (plural villes)[1] Old French vile;[2] ville from about 1200.[2][3]

Etymology

It is inherited from Old French vile, inherited from Latin vīlla (“farm, country house”),[4][2][5][1][6] which from the 5th–6th centuries also meant a group of houses around the villa, roughly a village.[4][2][5] In Gallo-Romance it came to mean a town, the towns often having grown up on old rural estates around an ancient city.[5][3][2] Latin villa is related to Latin vīcus (“village, quarter”), from the Indo-European Proto-Indo-European *weyḱ- (“settlement, clan”).[2][7] It is a doublet of villa.[1]

Cognate with Italian villa, Spanish villa and Portuguese vila.[7][8]

Earliest recorded meaning

The Passion de Clermont (late 10th century) calls Bethphage, below the Mount of Olives, a vile, a small settlement, while Jerusalem is a ciptad “city”;[4] the Chanson de Roland (about 1100) uses it for a large town, Zaragoza.[4][2]

Semantic evolution

In Old and Middle French it could still mean a rural estate or farm (late 12th century), the sense behind village, and a group of rural houses around a castle.[4][2][3] Classical French and the dictionaries until the 19th century defined it as a settlement enclosed by walls, a feature that no longer counts.[2]

Phrases include habit de ville “town clothes” (1549), hôtel de ville “town hall”, en ville “in town” and dîner en ville “to dine out”.[4][9] In Louisiana la Ville is New Orleans.[1]

Timeline

  • late 10th century – Vile, a small settlement.[4][3]
  • c. 1100 – A large town (Zaragoza, in the Roland).[4][2]
  • late 12th century – A rural estate.[4]
  • c. 1200 – The spelling ville.[2]
  • 1549 – Habit d'homme de ville.[4]

Meanings

Noun

  1. A town or city.[9][1]
  2. The town as opposed to the country: vivre à la ville.[9][4]
  3. The town's inhabitants or its administration: toute la ville en parle, hôtel de ville.[9][7]
  4. En ville: in town; out (dîner en ville).[9]
  • villa
  • village
  • vilain
  • Latin vīlla

References

  1. ^ a b c d e f g Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
  2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k Rey, Alain, ed. (1992), Dictionnaire historique de la langue française, Paris: Le Robert
  3. ^ a b c d Rey, Alain, ed. (2005), Le Grand Robert de la langue française, electronic version, Paris: Le Robert
  4. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k 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
  5. ^ a b c Bloch, Oscar; Wartburg, Walther von (1989), Dictionnaire étymologique de la langue française, 8th ed., Paris: Presses universitaires de France
  6. ^ Wartburg, Walther von, et al. (1922–2002), Französisches Etymologisches Wörterbuch, 25 vols., Bonn / Leipzig / Basel: Klopp / Teubner / Zbinden, p. 14, 449b
  7. ^ a b c Littré, Émile (1873–1877), Dictionnaire de la langue française, 4 vols. and supplement, Paris: Hachette
  8. ^ Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter
  9. ^ a b c d e Rey-Debove, Josette; Rey, Alain, eds. (2007), Le Petit Robert de la langue française, Paris: Le Robert