hospital

Forms

hospital m (oblique plural hospitaus, hospitax; nominative singular hospitaus, hospitax)^[1]

• ospital, opital, hospitail, hospitel, hospitale^[2][3][4]

The corpora of the FROLEX index have ospital 71 times and hospital 54 times, with plurals such as hospitaulx.^[5]

Etymology

It is borrowed from Late Latin hospitālis (“hospice, shelter, guesthouse”), a learned borrowing, the Late Latin noun being a use of Latin hospitālis (“hospitable”), from hospes (“host, guest”).^[1] The Latin adjective is formed from that noun with the suffix -ālis.^[6] The TLFi traces the noun to Late Latin hospitālis domus (“house of refuge”), which in the Middle Ages narrowed in the monasteries to a charitable house for the poor and travellers, recorded from the first half of the 8th century in Bede.^[7] Bloch and Wartburg likewise say the word came into French through the convents.^[8] Gamillscheg starts from the Latin neuter hospitāle (“guest room”).^[9]

The form Old Occitan hospital already names a hospice of the monastery of Saint-Sernin in Toulouse in 1075–1078.^[7] The same Latin adjective had earlier given the inherited ostel “lodging”, which the FEW treats in the same article.^[1][10]

Earliest recorded meaning

The AND's first citation for the word is dated 1130–1140.^[3] On the continent it first appears in Chrétien de Troyes's Erec et Enide, about 1170, for a charitable house that takes in the poor and travellers: N'avoit chastel, vile ne tor, Ne meison fort ne abaïe, Ospital ne herbergerie “there was neither castle, town nor tower, nor stronghold nor abbey, hospice nor lodging”.^[11][7][2]

Semantic evolution

The word first named any religious house that sheltered people in need, pilgrims among them, and the sick only as one group among others.^[8][4] From 1181 it also named the Hospital of Saint John of Jerusalem and the order that served it, after Latin Ospitale Jherosolimitanum of 1108.^[7] Tobler–Lommatzsch records both the order of the Hospitallers and an adjective meaning “hospitable”.^[12] Guernes de Pont-Sainte-Maxence speaks of a hospital for lepers near Canterbury.^[13]

In Middle French the word still meant a charitable house, often run by a monastery, that gave shelter more than care.^[14] The sense of a house for the sick is dated 1671, and the modern word French hôpital was told apart from French hospice only in the 19th century.^[7][8]

Timeline

• 1130–1140 – first citation in the AND.^[3]
• c. 1170 – ospital in Chrétien de Troyes's Erec et Enide.^[11][15][7]
• 1181 – maison de l'Ospital de Jerusalem, for the order of Saint John.^[7]
• 1190–1200 – hospital in Denis Piramus's Vie seint Edmund, an Anglo-Norman text.^[16]
• 1195 – the order of the Hospital in Ambroise's Estoire de la guerre sainte.^[7]
• 1671 – hôpital for a house for the sick.^[7]

Meanings

Noun

1. a hospice, a charitable house that takes in the poor, pilgrims and travellers.^[11][3][17]
2. a hospital or almshouse.^[3][17]
3. the order of the Hospital of Saint John of Jerusalem, the Knights Hospitaller.^[3][18]
4. a guest-house, an inn.^[3]

Adjective

1. hospitable, welcoming.^[3][18][1]

Anglo-Norman

The AND heads the word hospital, first cites it from 1130–1140, and lists spellings such as hospitel, hospytal, ospital and the plurals hospitaus and hospiteux.^[3] Its insular senses run from “hospitable” and “hospice” to an almshouse, a guest-house or inn, and the military order of the Hospitallers.^[3] Wiktionary gives an Anglo-Norman form ospitel as the source of Middle Irish ospitél.^[1] The MED derives Middle English hospital from the Old French word as well as Medieval Latin hospitāle,^[19] and Etymonline dates the English word to the middle of the 13th century, first for a shelter for the needy.^[20]

Descendants

• Middle French hospital (→ French hôpital)^[14][1]
• Middle English hospital (borrowed; → English hospital)^[19][20]

Related words

• ostel

Usage notes

The dictionaries head the word differently: Tobler–Lommatzsch and the DÉCT under ospital,^[12][11] Godefroy and the AND under hospital,^[13][3] and the DMF under hospital with the modern form hôpital.^[14]

References

1. ^ a b c d e f Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ 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. ospital
3. ^ 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. hospital
4. ^ a b Rey, Alain, ed. (1992), Dictionnaire historique de la langue française, Paris: Le Robert, p. s.v. hôpital
5. ^ FROLEX 3.0, lexique morphologique du français médiéval (IXe–XVe s.), Base de français médiéval, ENS de Lyon (from the BFM, the Nouveau Corpus d'Amsterdam and the DMF), github.com/sheiden/Medieval-French-Language-Toolkit
6. ^ Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press, p. s.v. hospitālis
7. ^ a b c d e f g h i 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
8. ^ a b c Bloch, Oscar; Wartburg, Walther von (1989), Dictionnaire étymologique de la langue française, 8th ed., Paris: Presses universitaires de France, p. 364
9. ^ Gamillscheg, Ernst (1966–1969), Etymologisches Wörterbuch der französischen Sprache, 2nd, fully revised ed., Heidelberg: Winter, p. 559
10. ^ Wartburg, Walther von, et al. (1922–2002), Französisches Etymologisches Wörterbuch, 25 vols., Bonn / Leipzig / Basel: Klopp / Teubner / Zbinden, p. 4:493
11. ^ a b c d Dictionnaire électronique de Chrétien de Troyes (DÉCT), LFA / Université d'Ottawa – ATILF, CNRS / Université de Lorraine (2014), p. s.v. ospital
12. ^ a b Tobler, Adolf; Lommatzsch, Erhard (1925–2002), Altfranzösisches Wörterbuch, 11 vols., Berlin / Wiesbaden / Stuttgart: Weidmann / Steiner, p. 6:1341
13. ^ a b Godefroy, Frédéric (1881–1902), Dictionnaire de l'ancienne langue française et de tous ses dialectes du IXe au XVe siècle, 10 vols., Paris: Vieweg / Bouillon, p. 9:768
14. ^ a b c Dictionnaire du Moyen Français, version 2015 (DMF 2015), ATILF – CNRS & Université de Lorraine, atilf.fr/dmf, p. s.v. hospital
15. ^ 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. ErecR
16. ^ Stein, Achim; Kunstmann, Pierre; Gleßgen, Martin-D., eds., Nouveau Corpus d'Amsterdam, version 4 (lemmatised corpus of Old French texts, after A. Dees), Universität Stuttgart, github.com/michaniets/NCA (texts by DEAF siglum), p. EdmK*
17. ^ a b 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. ospital
18. ^ a b Tobler, Adolf; Lommatzsch, Erhard (1925–2002), Altfranzösisches Wörterbuch, 11 vols., Berlin / Wiesbaden / Stuttgart: Weidmann / Steiner, p. 6:1342
19. ^ a b Kurath, Hans; Kuhn, Sherman M.; Lewis, Robert E., eds. (1952–2001), Middle English Dictionary, Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press; online edition ed. Frances McSparran et al. (2000–2018)
20. ^ a b Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com