Old French Sancier, Essancier

Author(s): Charles H. Livingston

Source: Modern Language Notes, Vol. 70, No. 4 (Apr., 1955), pp. 280-282
Published by: The Johns Hopkins University Press
Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/3039780
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Bouillon, Hugues Capet, Froissart, Chastellain. Tobler proposed as
etymology VL * exemptiare.1 Gaston Paris, 2 admitting that Tobler's
etymology might be acceptable for sense, points out, however, that the
an syllable under the accent, never rhymes with en. In fact the word,
in rhyme and outside, is always written with an in these texts of the
northeast where the sounds an and en were differentiated. After
examining the senses of sancier, essancier in a number of texts, Gaston
Paris was convinced that these verbs were to be related etymologically
to Latin sanus 'sound, whole, healthy (physically or mentally).' He
proposed as etymological base a VL type *sanitiare, *exsanitiare,
formed on *sanitia, a supposed variant of sanUtas. Objections to this
derivation came from G. Gro5ber3 and M. S. Garner.4 Paris subse-
quently admitted the validity of these criticisms and says: " Je
rattacherais maintenant sancier 'a sano (sanare) par un autre inter-
mediaire que *sanftia." -5 He never seems to have explained this " autre
intermediaire."

W. Meyer-Liibke (REW 7581)6 gives as etymology of OF sancier,

essancier, the *sanitiare of Paris but considers it to be " zweifelhaft."
He rejects Tobler's *exemptiare for the reasons set forth by Paris.
I believe with the latter that the Latin verb sano, sanare 'to make
sound, to heal, to cure, restore to health,' with extended senses ' cor-
rect, restore, allay, quiet,' is the source of OF sancier (essancier)
which corresponds so closely to it in its various meanings.
Latin sanare in Vulgar Latin might well have had a past participle
*sanitus. Many verbs of the first conjugation in Latin had past parti-
ciples in -itus: crepitus (crepare), cubitus (cubare), domitus (domare),
plicitus (plicare), sonitus (sonare), tonitus (tonare), vetitus(vetare).
In Vulgar Latin the formation of a past participle in -itus for verbs
of the first conjugation is a fairly frequent phenomenon: I *cavitus,
*excavitus (cavare; REW 1792), *exlavitus (lavare; REW 3020),
levitus (levare; REW 5005), provitus (probare), rogitus (rogare),
vocit us, evocitus, provocitus (vocare 'call'), *vocitus (vocare = vacare;

1 GUttingische gelehrte Anzeiger (1877), pp. 1622 ff.

2 Article sancier, essancier in MAlanges linguistiques publi6s par Mario
Roques (Paris, 1909), pp. 608ff.
3Zeitschr. f. rom. Phil., iII, 314; cf. Romania, viII, 631.
'American Journal of Philology, i, 111-116.
6 Mel. ling., 610, note 2.
6 Rormanisches Etymologisches W6rterbuch (3rd ed.; Heidelberg, 1935).
7C. H. Grandgent, Vulgar Latin (Boston, 1907), p. 183, ? 435; p. 184,
? 439; W. Meyer-Luibke, Die lateinische Sprache in den romanischen Landern
in G. Grober, Grundriss der romanischen Philologie, I (2), 480.

VOL. LXX, April 1955 281

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REW 9429), etc.8 On this Vulgar Latin past participle *sanitus
a new verb was formed with suffix -iare: *sanitiare. Such verb forma-
tions on past participles with suffix -iare go back to the most remote
periods of Vulgar Latin 9: captiare (captus), *corruptiare (corruptus),
directitare (directus), *distractiare (distractus), *pertusiare. (pertu-
sus), punctiare (punctus), *raptiare (raptus), rectiare (rectus),
*subversiare (subversus), *suctiare (suctus), *tractiare (tractus),
etc.'0 The sense of *sanitiare, thus formed, was, as is usually the
case in such derived verbs, about the same as that of the simple
verb sanare. A VL *san,tiare, thus conceived, would give quite regu-
larly OF sancier (essancier).
There is a variant form essanicier of essancier, found only in a
Vie de Saint Alexis (c. 1200)," which I think may be quite naturally
explained by analogy with semi-learned sanite', doublet of sante (sani-
tatem). To judge by its frequent occurrence in texts of various sorts
throughout the middle ages, sardite was in common use. The relation-
ship of OF sante' and OF sardite to OF sancier (essancier) must have
early been evident and might well have led to the popular creation
in Old French of the lengthened essaricier. The rarity of the latter
seems to favor this hypothesis and to support the primary etymology:
VL *sanitiare > sancier.

Bowdoin College CHARLES H. LIVINGSTON

8 Verbs like cubare (couver), probare (prouver), vocare (vouer), levare

(lever' had also the normal past participle in -atu. Sanare would also be in
this category, if we admit its past participle * sanitus alongside of sanatus:
cf. OF saner, resaner 'guerir' and past participle san6 (Godefroy).
9 Antoine Thomas in Dictionnaire g6neral de la langue frangaise (Paris,
1938), p. 71.
10 As in the case of *sanitiare, a verb *excavitiare, formed on a past
participle in itus (excavare, *excavitus; REW 1792), may account for
Italian scavizzolare alongside of scavitolare.
" Romania, viII, 163. La vie de Saint Alexis en vers octosyllabiques, verse
934 (p. 180). Gaston Paris later found a form resanicier to which he did
not give a text reference and which is not in Godefroy. It is apparently as
rare in the texts as essanicier; cf. M61. ling., 610, note 2.

282 Modern Language Notes

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