estreindre

Forms

estreindre (present participle estreignant; past participle estreint; first-person singular present estreing)^[1]

• estraindre, estrandre, estreyndre^[2]

Chrétien de Troyes writes estraindre, estraing and estraint.^[3]

Etymology

It is inherited from Latin stringō (“to bind fast, tighten; to strip off”).^{[1][4][5][6][7]} The Latin verb, with the past participle strictus, belongs to the family of strigilis (“scraper”).^[7] Wiktionary traces the Latin verb partly to Proto-Indo-European *streyg- (“to strip”) and partly to *strengʰ- (“to twist”).^[1]

Earliest recorded meaning

The DEAF's earliest dated reference is to Rashi's French glosses on the Talmud, of the end of the 11th century.^[8][9] The PROFITEROLE corpus lemmatises a form estreit in the Chanson de Roland under the verb.^[10] The TLFi's first record is the Couronnement de Louis, about 1135, where the verb means to bind someone.^[11]

Semantic evolution

The verb meant to grip or squeeze tightly, and, from that to bind a person, to clasp someone in one's arms, and to oppress.^[12][3] The reflexive “to gird oneself” is in Wace's Rou (1160–1174), the heart that is gripped by grief in Benoît's Roman de Troie about 1165, and the embrace in Marie de France's Lais about 1170.^[11][7] Chrétien uses it for tightening a noose or a garment, for clenching the teeth (estreindre les denz), and for holding a loved one or an opponent.^[3] Greimas adds “to force”, “to deliberate earnestly” (estreindre le conseil) and sor l'estraindre “on the point of death”.^[12]

The figurative sense of oppressing did not return until the 19th century, while holding in the arms became the main sense of modern French étreindre.^[7]

Timeline

• 1085–1100 – Rashi's French glosses, the DEAF's earliest reference.^[8][9]
• c. 1100 – estreit in the Chanson de Roland, as lemmatised in PROFITEROLE.^[10]
• 1100–1133 – the first Anglo-Norman citation in the AND.^[2]
• c. 1135 – “to bind (someone)” in the Couronnement de Louis.^[11]
• c. 1170 – “to embrace” in Marie de France's Lais, and estraindre in Chrétien's Erec.^[11][3]

Meanings

Verb

1. to squeeze, press or grip tightly; to tighten (a knot, a garment).^[3][2]
2. to embrace, clasp in one's arms.^[3][2]
3. to bind or wrap tightly.^[11][2]
4. to oppress, harass; to force.^[12][2]
5. to strain (off), drain; to stretch.^[2][1]
6. estreindre les denz: to clench or gnash the teeth.^[3][2]

Anglo-Norman

The AND heads the verb estreindre, first cites it from the first third of the 12th century, and lists estraindre, estrandre and estreyndre.^[2] The insular senses add compressing the bowels, squeezing out, straining off a liquid, overcrowding a place, and narrowing.^[2] Middle English streinen “to tie, bind” is recorded from about 1300 and comes from the present stem of the Old French verb; it is the English strain.^[13]

Word family

• estreint

Descendants

• French étreindre^[1]
• Norman êtreindre^[1]
• Middle English straynen (borrowed; → English strain)^[1]

Related words

• astreindre
• constraindre
• destraindre
• estroit
• estreit
• restreindre

Usage notes

Tobler–Lommatzsch, Godefroy, the DÉCT and the AND head the verb estreindre, the DMF estreindre too, and Foerster and Greimas estraindre.^{[14][3][2][15][12][16]}

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 Anglo-Norman Dictionary (AND2), Aberystwyth University, anglo-norman.net (2nd ed., 2005–), p. s.v. estreindre
3. ^ a b c d e f g h Dictionnaire électronique de Chrétien de Troyes (DÉCT), LFA / Université d'Ottawa – ATILF, CNRS / Université de Lorraine (2014), p. s.v. estreindre
4. ^ Wartburg, Walther von, et al. (1922–2002), Französisches Etymologisches Wörterbuch, 25 vols., Bonn / Leipzig / Basel: Klopp / Teubner / Zbinden, p. 12:304
5. ^ Gamillscheg, Ernst (1966–1969), Etymologisches Wörterbuch der französischen Sprache, 2nd, fully revised ed., Heidelberg: Winter, p. 430
6. ^ Bloch, Oscar; Wartburg, Walther von (1989), Dictionnaire étymologique de la langue française, 8th ed., Paris: Presses universitaires de France, p. 281
7. ^ a b c d Rey, Alain, ed. (1992), Dictionnaire historique de la langue française, Paris: Le Robert, p. s.v. étreindre
8. ^ a b Baldinger, Kurt; Möhren, Frankwalt; Städtler, Thomas, eds. (1971–2021), Dictionnaire étymologique de l'ancien français (DEAF), Heidelberg: Heidelberger Akademie der Wissenschaften; DEAFél / DEAFpré, deaf-server.adw.uni-heidelberg.de, p. s.v. estreindre
9. ^ a b Möhren, Frankwalt, Dictionnaire étymologique de l'ancien français (DEAF): Complément bibliographique, electronic version (DEAFBiblEl), Heidelberger Akademie der Wissenschaften, alma.hadw-bw.de/deafbibl (texts by siglum, with their dates), p. RaschiD2
10. ^ a b UD Old French PROFITEROLE and UD Middle French PROFITEROLE treebanks, Universal Dependencies (from the SRCMF and the Base de français médiéval; texts by DEAF siglum), p. RolS
11. ^ a b c d e 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
12. ^ a b c d Greimas, Algirdas Julien (1979), Dictionnaire de l'ancien français jusqu'au milieu du XIVe siècle, 2nd ed., Paris: Larousse (printing of 1988), p. s.v. estraindre
13. ^ Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
14. ^ Tobler, Adolf; Lommatzsch, Erhard (1925–2002), Altfranzösisches Wörterbuch, 11 vols., Berlin / Wiesbaden / Stuttgart: Weidmann / Steiner, p. 3:1469
15. ^ Foerster, Wendelin; Breuer, Hermann (1914), Kristian von Troyes: Wörterbuch zu seinen sämtlichen Werken, Halle: Niemeyer, p. 134
16. ^ Dictionnaire du Moyen Français, version 2015 (DMF 2015), ATILF – CNRS & Université de Lorraine, atilf.fr/dmf, p. s.v. estreindre