French word and meaning in english - Word и Excel - помощь в работе с программами

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Many words in the English vocabulary are of French origin, most coming from the Anglo-Norman spoken by the upper classes in England for several hundred years after the Norman Conquest, before the language settled into what became Modern English. English words of French origin, such as art, competition, force, machine, and table are pronounced according to English rules of phonology, rather than French, and are commonly used by English speakers without any consciousness of their French origin.

This article, on the other hand, covers French words and phrases that have entered the English lexicon without ever losing their character as Gallicisms: they remain unmistakably «French» to an English speaker. They are most common in written English, where they retain French diacritics and are usually printed in italics. In spoken English, at least some attempt is generally made to pronounce them as they would sound in French; an entirely English pronunciation is regarded as a solecism.

Some of them were never «good French», in the sense of being grammatical, idiomatic French usage. Some others were once normal French but have become very old-fashioned, or have acquired different meanings and connotations in the original language, to the extent that they would not be understood (either at all, or in the intended sense) by a native French speaker.

Contents
A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z Not used as such in French — Found only in English — French phrases in international air-sea rescue — See also — References

Contents

A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z

Not used as such in French — Found only in English — French phrases in international air-sea rescue — See also — References

Used in English and French[edit]

A[edit]

à la: short for (ellipsis of) à la manière de; in the manner of/in the style of^[1]
à la carte: lit. «on the card, i.e. menu»; In restaurants it refers to ordering individual dishes «à la carte» rather than a fixed-price meal «menu». In America «à la Carte Menu» can be found, an oxymoron and a pleonasm.
à propos: regarding/concerning (the correct French syntax is à propos de)
aide-de-camp: lit. «camp helper»; A military officer who serves as an adjutant to a higher-ranking officer, prince or other high political dignitary.
aide-mémoire: lit. «memory aid»; an object or memorandum to assist in remembrance, or a diplomatic paper proposing the major points of discussion
amour propre: «Self-love», Self-respect.
amuse-bouche or amuse-gueule: lit. «mouth-amuser»; a single, bite-sized hors d’œuvre. In France, the exact expression used is amuse-gueule, gueule being slang for mouth (gueule is the mouth of a carnivorous animal; when used to describe the mouth of a human, it is vulgar—akin to «gob»— although the expression in itself is not vulgar). The expression refers to a small mouthful of food, served at the discretion of the chef before a meal as an hors d’oeuvre or between main courses.
ancien régime: a sociopolitical or other system that no longer exists, an allusion to pre-revolutionary France (used with capital letters in French with this meaning: Ancien Régime)
aperçu: preview; a first impression; initial insight.
apéritif or aperitif: lit. «[drink] opening the appetite», a before-meal drink.^[2] In colloquial French, un apéritif is usually shortened to un apéro.
appellation contrôlée: supervised use of a name. For the conventional use of the term, see Appellation d’origine contrôlée
appetence: 1. A natural craving or desire 2. An attraction or affinity; From French word «Appétence», derived from «Appétit» (Appetite). In French, belongs to high-level language.
après moi, le déluge: lit. «After me, the deluge», a remark attributed to Louis XV of France in reference to the impending end of a functioning French monarchy and predicting the French Revolution. It is derived from Madame de Pompadour’s après nous, le déluge, «after us, the deluge». The Royal Air Force No. 617 Squadron, famously known as the «Dambusters», uses this as its motto.
arête: a narrow ridge. In French, also fishbone; edge of a polyhedron or graph; bridge of the nose.
armoire: a type of cabinet; wardrobe.
arrière-pensée: ulterior motive; concealed thought, plan, or motive.
art nouveau: a style of decoration and architecture of the late 19th and early 20th centuries. It takes a capital in French (Art nouveau).
attaché: a person attached to an embassy; in French it is also the past participle of the verb attacher (= to fasten, to tighten, to be linked)
attaque au fer: an attack on the opponent’s blade in fencing, e.g. beat, expulsion, pressure.
au contraire: on the contrary.
au courant: up-to-date; abreast of current affairs.
au fait: being conversant in or with, or instructed in or with.
au gratin: «with gratings», anything that is grated onto a food dish. In English, specifically ‘with cheese’.
au jus: lit. «with juice», referring to a food course served with sauce. Often redundantly formulated, as in ‘Open-faced steak sandwich, served with au jus.’ No longer used in French, except for the colloquial, être au jus (to be informed).
au naturel: 1. a. Nude. b. In a natural state: an au naturel hairstyle. 2. Cooked simply. Also used in French heraldry to mean «proper» i.e. in natural colours.
au pair: a young foreigner who does domestic chores in exchange for room and board. In France, those chores are mainly child care/education.
au revoir !: «See you later!» In French, a contraction of Au plaisir de vous revoir (‘to the pleasure of seeing you again’).

au sec

lit. «almost dry», reducing liquid to the point of almost dry but food is still moist.
avant-garde (pl. avant-gardes): applied to cutting-edge or radically innovative movements in art, music and literature; figuratively ‘on the edge’, literally, a military term, meaning ‘vanguard’ (which is a corruption of avant-garde) or «advance guard», in other words, «first to attack» (antonym of arrière-garde).
avant la lettre: used to describe something or someone seen as a forerunner of something (such as an artistic or political movement) before that something was recognized and named, e.g., «a post-modernist avant la lettre», «a feminist avant la lettre». The expression literally means «before the letter», i.e., «before it had a name». A French modern alternative form of this expression is avant l’heure.
avoirdupois: used in Middle English, avoir de pois = commodities sold by weight, alteration of Old French aveir de peis = «goods of weight». In Modern French, only used to refer to English weight measures, as in une livre avoirdupois (1 lb. avdp) as opposed to une livre troy (1 lb. troy).

B[edit]

baguette: a long, narrow loaf of bread with a crisp crust, often called «French bread» or «French stick» in the United Kingdom. In French, a baguette is any long and narrow stick-like object, for example a «chopstick». Also, a rectangular diamond, cut to twenty-five facets.
banquette: a long upholstered bench or a sofa.
beaucoup de: Used interchangeably with the English equivalent of «lots of/many/a great number of». Appropriate when the speaker wants to convey a greater positive connotation and/or greater emphasis. Often used as an informal expression, mostly in small regional dialect-pockets in the Canadian Prairies and the American South, especially in Alberta and Louisiana respectively.::
Beau idéal: lit. «beautiful ideal,» used to suggest the perfect or most supreme version of something to exist. The expression was coined during the late 18th century during the aesthetic period known as classicism. Invoking the balance and refinement of Greek and Roman art and architecture, the term was used for art and architecture that conformed to purity, wholesomeness, equilibrium, and simple elegance.^[3]
Beau geste: lit. «beautiful gesture», a gracious gesture, noble in form but often futile or meaningless in substance. This French expression has been pressing at the door of standard English with only partial success, since the appearance of P. C. Wren’s Beau Geste (1924), the first of his Foreign Legion novels.^[4]
Beaux-Arts: monumental architectural style of the early 20th century made famous by the Académie des Beaux-Arts.
bel esprit (pl. beaux esprits): lit. «fine mind»; a cultivated, highly intelligent person.
Belle Époque: a period in European social history that began during the late 19th century and lasted until World War I.
belles-lettres: lit. «fine letters»; literature regarded for its aesthetic value rather than its didactic or informative content; also, light, stylish writings, usually on literary or intellectual subjects
bien entendu: well understood, well known, obvious – «of course»
bien pensant: lit. «well thinking»; right thinking, orthodox. Formerly implied willful blindness to dangers or suffering faced by others but, nowadays corresponds to «politically correct». The noun form bien-pensance is rarely seen in English.
billet-doux: lit. «sweet note», love letter^[5]
blasé: unimpressed with something because of overfamiliarity, jaded.
bon appétit: lit. «good appetite»; «enjoy your meal».
bon mot (pl. bons mots): well-chosen word(s), particularly a witty remark («each bon mot which falls from his lips is analysed and filed away for posterity», The European Magazine, August 29 – September 4, 1996)
bon vivant: one who enjoys the good life, an epicurean.
bon voyage: lit. «good journey»; have a good trip!
bourgeois: member of the bourgeoisie, originally councilmen, burghers or even aristocrats living in towns in the Middle Ages. Now the term is derogatory, and it applies to a person whose beliefs, attitudes, and practices are conventionally middle-class.
bric-à-brac: small ornamental objects, less valuable than antiques; a collection of old furniture, china, plates and curiosities. Cf. de bric et de broc, corresponding to English «by hook or by crook», and brack, refuse.
bricolage: to improvise or assemble something useful from what happens to be at hand; to expedite or economize a project with readily available components, versus a kit or outside sources; to reuse spare parts for other than their original purpose; to create something new by arranging old material; to create a new, valuable purpose for an object that has completed its original purpose and would otherwise be discarded. Connotes an intrepid do-it-yourself spirit or clever repurposing. Differs from tinkering which merely modifies an existing arrangement. The term is used metaphorically to describe inventive philosophy, theories, and practices in business and academic fields, where new concepts are found in interactions of old ideas.
brioche: a sweet yeast bun, kind of a crossover between a popover and a light muffin; French also use the term as slang for ‘potbelly’, because of the overhang effect.
bureau (pl. bureaux): government office; an agency for information exchange. Also means «desk» in French, and in the U.K.

C[edit]

ça ne fait rien: «that doesn’t matter»; rendered as san fairy Ann in British World War I slang.^[6]^[7]
cache: a collection of items of the same type stored in a hidden or inaccessible place (such as in an oubliette). Often used for weapons.
cachet: lit. «stamp»; a distinctive quality; quality, prestige.
café: a coffee shop (also used in French for «coffee»).
café au lait: coffee with milk; or a light-brown color. In medicine, it is also used to describe a birthmark that is of a light-brown color (café au lait spot).
calque: a copied term/thing.
canard: (canard means «duck» in French)

an unfounded rumor or anecdote.
a leading airfoil attached to an aircraft forward of the main wing.
a slang word for «newspaper».
a piece of sugar slightly soused with coffee or cognac (or another strong alcohol).

canapé: A small, prepared and usually decorative food, held in the fingers and often eaten in one bite. In French, it can also refer to a «sofa».
carte blanche: lit. «white card» (i.e. blank check); unlimited authority.
carte de visite: lit. «visiting card»; a calling card.
cause célèbre: controversial celebrity issue.

c’est la guerre: «That’s war!», or…

c’est la vie: «That’s life!» or «Such is life!»

Though either foreign expression can be used to say that life is harsh but that one must accept it, the former may imply a more deliberate cause thereof,^[8] while the latter, more accidental.^[9]
chaise longue: a long chair for reclining; sometimes misstated as «chaise lounge»
Champs-Élysées: lit. «Elysian Fields»; Avenue des Champs-Élysées, one of the broadest boulevards in Paris. Often referred to as simply les Champs.
chanteuse: ‘(female) singer’, a female singer, especially at a nightclub, bar, cabaret, or diner.^[10]^[11]^[12]^[13]
chargé d’affaires: a diplomat left in charge of day-to-day business at a diplomatic mission. Within the United States Department of State, a «chargé» is any officer left in charge of the mission in the absence of the titular chief of mission.
charrette: a collaborative session in which a group of designers draft a solution to a design problem.
chauffeur: driver.
chef d’œuvre: a masterpiece.
cherchez la femme: «look for / seek the woman», in the sense that, when a man behaves out of character or in an otherwise apparently inexplicable manner, the reason may be found in his trying to cover up an illicit affair with a woman, or to impress or gain favour with a woman. This expression was first used in a novel by Alexandre Dumas (père), in the third chapter of Les Mohicans de Paris (1854), in the form of cherchons la femme («let’s look for the woman»). The expression is found in John Latey’s 1878 English translation: «Ah! Monsieur Jackal, you were right when you said, ‘Seek the woman.'» The phrase was adopted into everyday English use and crossed the Atlantic by 1909.^[14]
chez: at the house of: often used in the names of restaurants and the like; Chez Marie = «Marie’s».
chic: stylish.
chignon: a hairstyle worn in a roll at the nape of the neck.
cinéma pur: an avant-garde film movement which was born in Paris in the 1920s and 1930s.
cinéma vérité: realism in documentary filmmaking. «Vérité» means «truth».
cliché: originally referred to a printer’s block used to reproduce type, compare the original meaning of stereotype. A phrase that has become trite through overuse; a stereotype.
clique: a small exclusive group of friends; always used in a pejorative way in French and, usually, in English. Often pronounced the same as «click» in British English.
cloisonné: an ancient technique for decorating metalwork objects.
commandant: commanding officer of a base, depot or training area. In France, used for an airline pilot (le commandant de bord), in the Army as appellative for a chef de bataillon or a chef d’escadron (roughly equivalent to a major) or in the Navy for any officer from capitaine de corvette to capitaine de vaisseau (equivalent to the Army’s majors, lieutenant-colonels and colonels) or for any officer heading a ship.
comme ci, comme ça: lit. «like this, like that»; neither good nor bad, so-so.
communiqué: lit. «communicated»; an official communication.
concierge: a receptionist at a hotel or residence.
concordat: an agreement; a treaty; when used with a capital C in French, it refers to the treaty between the French State and Judaeo-Christian religions during the French Empire (Napoleon): priests, ministers and rabbis became civil servants. This treaty was abolished in 1905 (law Church-State separation) but is still in use in Alsace-Lorraine (those territories were under German administration during 1871–1918).
confrère (also confrere): a colleague, an associate^[15]
contre-coup: against the blow. This word describes the repercussion of a physical or mental shock, or an indirect consequence of an event.
contre-jour: against daylight. This word (mostly used in art namely photography, cinema or painting) describes the light that illumines an object from the other side of your own point of view.
contretemps: an awkward clash; a delay.
coquette: a flirtatious girl; a tease.
cordon bleu: (lit. «blue ribbon»). A «cordon bleu» may refer to several things, both in French and in English :

A person who excels in cooking.
An award given to such a person.
An international group of hospitality management and cooking schools teaching French cuisine, founded in France.
An escalope of veal, chicken or pork stuffed with ham and cheese, then breaded and fried.

cordon sanitaire: a policy of containment directed against a hostile entity or ideology; a chain of buffer states; lit. «quarantine line».
corniche: a road that clings like a ledge to the side of a cliff or mountain.
cortège: a funeral procession; in French has a broader meaning and refers to all kinds of processions.
coup de foudre: lit. «thunderbolt» («strike of thunder»); a sudden unforeseen event, usually used to describe love at first sight.
coup d’état: political coup, government overthrow
coup de grâce: the final blow that results in victory (lit. «blow of mercy»), historically used in the context of the battlefield to refer to the killing of badly wounded enemy soldiers, now more often used in a figurative context (e.g., business).
coup de main: (lit. «a blow with the hand»), means «help from someone». Example: «Besoin d’un coup de main?» means «Need help?»

coup de maître: stroke of the master, master stroke. This word describes a planned action skilfully done. See also tour de force below
coup de théâtre: a dramatic turn of events.^[16]
coup d’œil: lit. «a blow (or touch) of the eye»; a glance.
couture: litt. sewing. Fashion (usually refers to high fashion). haute couture in French.
couturier: a fashion designer (usually refers to high fashion, rather than everyday clothes design. In French, it means ‘tailor’; a couturière is a seamstress.
crèche: a nativity display; more commonly (in the United Kingdom), a place where children are left by their parents for short periods in the supervision of childminders; both meanings still exist in French.^[17]
crème brûlée: lit. «burnt cream»; a dessert consisting primarily of custard and toasted sugar, that is, caramel.
crème de la crème: best of the best, «cream of the cream», used to describe highly skilled people or objects. A synonymous expression in French is fin du fin.
crème fraîche: lit. «fresh cream», a heavy cream slightly soured with bacterial culture, but not as sour or as thick as sour cream and does not curdle.
crêpe: a thin sweet or savoury pancake eaten as a light meal or dessert.

crêperie: a takeaway restaurant or stall, serving crêpes as a form of fast food or street food, or may be a more formal sit-down restaurant or café.
critique: a critical analysis or evaluation of a work, or the art of criticizing. From Latin criticus, from Ancient Greek κριτικός (kritikos).
croissant: a crescent-shaped bread made of flaky pastry; in French also the word for crescent.
cul-de-sac: originally «bottom of sack»^[18] and used in English in anatomy since 1738. Used for dead end (street) since 1800 in English, since 14th century in French.^[19] The often heard erroneous folk etymology «arse [buttocks] of the sack» is based on the current meaning of cul in French, but cul-de-sac is used to refer to dead ends in modern French and is not vulgar, though the terms impasse and voie sans issue are more common in modern French.

D[edit]

de rigueur: required or expected, especially in fashion or etiquette.^[20]
de trop: unnecessary, unwanted, or more than is suitable.
déclassé: inferior.
décolleté: a woman’s garment with a low-cut neckline that exposes cleavage, or a situation in which a woman’s chest or cleavage is exposed; décolletage is dealt with below.
décor: the layout and furnishing of a room.
découpage: decoration with cut paper.
demi-glace: a reduced wine-based sauce for meats and poultry.
demi-sec: semi-dry, usually said of wine.
déjà vu: lit. «already seen»: an impression or illusion of having seen or experienced something before.
dénouement: lit. «untying»: the resolution of a narrative.
dépanneur: (Quebec English) a convenience store.
dérailleur: a bicycle gear-shift mechanism.
dernier cri: lit. «latest scream»: the latest fashion.
derrière: lit. «behind»: rear, buttocks.
déshabillé: partially clad or scantily dressed; also a special type of garment.
détente: easing of diplomatic tension.
digestif: a digestive aid, esp., an after-dinner drink, as brandy.^[21]
directeur sportif: lit. «sports director». A person responsible for the operation of a cycling team during a road bicycle race. In French, it means any kind of sports director.
divertissement: an amusing diversion; entertainment.
dossier: a file containing detailed information about a person.^[22] In modern French it can be any type of file, including a computer directory. In slang, J’ai des dossiers sur toi («I have files about you») means having materials for blackmail.
doyen: the senior member of a group; the feminine is doyenne.^[23] Also dean (of faculty, or medicine).
dressage: a form of competitive horse training, in French has the broader meaning of taming any kind of animal.
droit du seigneur: lit. «right of the lord»: the purported right of a lord in feudal times to take the virginity of one of his vassals’ brides on her wedding night (in precedence to her new husband). The French term for this hypothetical custom is droit de cuissage (from cuisse: thigh).
du jour: lit. «of the day»: said of something fashionable or hip for a day and quickly forgotten; today’s choice on the menu, as soup du jour.^[24]

E[edit]

eau de Cologne: a type of perfume, originating in Cologne. Its Italian creator used a French name to commercialize it, Cologne at that time being under the control of France.
eau de toilette: lit. «grooming water». It usually refers to an aromatic product that is less expensive than a perfume because it has less of the aromatic compounds and is more for an everyday use. Cannot be shortened to eau, which means something else altogether in French (water).
eau de vie: lit. «water of life» (cf. Aquavit and whisky), a type of fruit brandy.
écarté: a card game; also a ballet position.
échappé: dance movement foot position.
éclair: a cream and chocolate icing pastry.
éclat: great brilliance, as of performance or achievement. Conspicuous success. Great acclamation or applause.^[25]
écorché: flayed; biological graphic or model with skin removed.
élan: a distinctive flair or style.
élan vital: lit. «vital ardor»; the vital force hypothesized by Henri Bergson as a source of efficient causation and evolution in nature; also called «life-force»
éminence grise: lit. «grey eminence»: a publicity-shy person with little formal power but great influence over those in authority.
en banc: court hearing of the entire group of judges instead of a subset panel.
en bloc: as a group.
en garde: «[be] on [your] guard». «On guard» is of course perfectly good English: the French spelling is used for the fencing term.
en passant: in passing; term used in chess and in neurobiology («synapse en passant.»)
en plein air: lit. «in the open air»; particularly used to describe the act of painting outdoors.
en pointe: (in ballet) on tiptoe. Though used in French in this same context, it is not an expression as such. A pointe is the ballet figure where one stands on tiptoes. The expression «en pointe», though, means «in an acute angle», and, figuratively, it qualifies the most progressive or modern things (ideas, industry).
en route: on the way. Often written and pronounced «On route» in British English.
enfant terrible: lit. «terrible child»; a disruptively unconventional person.
ennui: A gripping listlessness or melancholia caused by boredom; depression
entente: diplomatic agreement or cooperation. L’Entente cordiale (the Cordial Entente) refers to the good diplomatic relationship between France and United Kingdom before the first World War.
entre nous: lit. «between us»; confidentially.
entrée: lit. «entrance»; the first course of a meal (UK English); used to denote the main dish or course of a meal (US English).
entremets: desserts/sweet dishes. More literally, a side dish that can be served between the courses of a meal.
entrepreneur: a person who undertakes and operates a new enterprise or venture and assumes some accountability for the inherent risks.
embonpoint: a plump, hourglass figure.
épater la bourgeoisie or épater le bourgeois: lit. «to shock the middle classes»,^[26] a rallying cry for the French Decadent poets of the late 19th century including Charles Baudelaire and Arthur Rimbaud.^[27]^[28]
escargot: snail; in English, used only as a culinary term.
esprit de corps: lit. «spirit of the body [group]»: a feeling of solidarity among members of a group; morale. Often used in connection with a military force.
esprit de l’escalier: lit. «wit of the stairs»; a concise, clever statement you think of too late, that is, on the stairs leaving the scene. The expression was created by French philosopher Denis Diderot.
l’État, c’est moi!: lit. «I am the state!» — attributed to the archetypal absolute monarch, Louis XIV of France.
étude: a musical composition designed to provide practice in a particular technical skill in the performance of an instrument. French for «study.»
étui: small ornamental case for needles or cosmetics.
excusez-moi: «Excuse me».
extraordinaire: extraordinary, usually as a following adjective, as «musician extraordinaire.»

F[edit]

façade: the front of an edifice (from the Italian facciata, or face); a fake persona, as in «putting on a façade» (the ç is pronounced like an s)
fait accompli: lit. «accomplished fact»; something that has already happened and is thus unlikely to be reversed; a done deal.^[29] In French, the term is primarily used in the expression placer/mettre quelqu’un devant le fait accompli, meaning to present somebody with a fait accompli. Also see point of no return.
faute de mieux: for want of better.
faites comme chez vous: Make yourself at home.
faux: false, ersatz, fake.
faux pas: lit. «false step»: violation of accepted, although unwritten, social rules.^[30]
femme fatale: lit. «deadly woman»: an attractive woman who seduces and takes advantage of men for her personal goals, after which she discards or abandons them. It extends to describe an attractive woman with whom a relationship is likely to result, or has already resulted, in pain and sorrow.^[31]
feuilleton: lit. «little leaf of paper»: a periodical, or part of a periodical, consisting chiefly of non-political news and gossip, literature and art criticism, a chronicle of the latest fashions, and epigrams, charades and other literary trifles.
fiancé(e): betrothed; lit. a man/woman engaged to be married.
film noir: Lit. «black film»: a stylized genre of movies from the 1940s and 1950s with a focus on crime and amorality.
fils: lit. «son»: used after a man’s surname to distinguish a son from a father, as Alexandre Dumas, fils.
fin de siècle: The end of the century, a term which typically encompasses both the meaning of the similar English idiom turn of the century and also makes reference to the closing of one era and onset of another.
flambé: a cooking procedure in which alcohol (ethanol) is added to a hot pan to create a burst of flames, meaning «flamed» in French. Also used colloquially in reference to something on fire or burned.
flambeau: a lit torch.
flâneur: a gentleman stroller of city streets; an aimless idler.

fleur-de-lis: a stylized-flower heraldic device; the golden fleur-de-lis on an azure background were the arms of the French Kingdom (often spelled with the old French style as «fleur-de-lys»).

fleur de sel: lit. «flower of salt», hand-harvested sea salt collected by workers who scrape only the top layer of salt before it sinks to the bottom of large salt pans. Is one of the more expensive salts; traditional French fleur de sel is collected off the coast of Brittany most notably in the town of Guérande (Fleur de Sel de Guérande being the most revered), but also in Noirmoutier, Île de Ré and Camargue.

foie gras: fatty liver; usually the liver of overfed goose, hence: pâté de foie gras, pâté made from goose liver.
folie à deux: a simultaneous occurrence of delusions in two closely related people, often said of an unsuitable romance. In clinical psychology, the term is used to describe people who share schizophrenic delusions. The derived forms folie à trois, folie à quatre, folie en famille or even folie à plusieurs do not exist in French where «collective hysterics» is used.
force majeure: an overpowering and unforeseeable event, especially when talking about weather (often appears in insurance contracts).
forte: Lit. «strong point» (of a sword). Strength, expertise, one’s strong point.
froideur: coldness (for behavior and manners only).

G[edit]

gaffe: blunder
garage: covered parking
garçon: lit. «boy» or «male servant»; sometimes used by English speakers to summon the attention of a male waiter (has a playful connotation in English but is condescending and possibly offensive in French).
gauche: lit. «left». Clumsy, tactless.
gaucherie: boorishness, clumsiness.
gendarme: a member of the gendarmerie; colloquially, a policeman
gendarmerie: a military body charged with police duties
genre: a type or class, such as «the thriller genre».
gîte: furnished vacation cottage typically in rural France.
glissade: slide down a slope.
Grand Prix: lit. «Great Prize»; a type of motor racing. English plural is Grands Prix.
Grand Guignol: a horror show, named after a French theater famous for its frightening plays and bloody special effects. (Guignol can be used in French to describe a ridiculous person, in the same way that clown might be used in English.)
grenadier: a specialized soldier, first established for the throwing of grenades and later as elite troops.

H[edit]

habitué: one who regularly frequents a place.^[32]
haute couture: lit. «high sewing»: Paris-based custom-fitted clothing; trend-setting fashion
haute école: lit. «high school»: advanced components of Classical dressage (horseback riding); when capitalized (Haute Ecole), refers to France’s most prestigious higher education institutions (e.g., Polytechnique, ENA, Les Mines)
hauteur: lit. «height»: arrogance.^[33]
haut monde: lit. the «high world»: fashionable society.
Honi soit qui mal y pense: «Shamed be he who thinks ill of it»; or sometimes translated as «Evil be to him who evil thinks»; the motto of the English Order of the Garter (modern French writes honni instead of Old French honi and would phrase «qui en pense du mal» instead of «qui mal y pense»). The sentence Honni soit qui mal y pense (often with double n) can still be used in French as a frozen expression to mean «Let nobody think ill of this» by allusion to the Garter’s motto. A more colloquial quasi-synonymous expression in French would be en tout bien tout honneur.
hors de combat: lit. «out of the fight»: prevented from fighting or participating in some event, usually by injury.
hors concours: lit. «out of competition»: not to be judged with others because of the superiority of the work to the others.
hors d’œuvre: lit. «outside the [main] work»: appetizer.

I[edit]

idée fixe: lit. «fixed idea»: obsession; in music, a leitmotiv.
impasse: a situation offering no escape, as a difficulty without solution, an argument where no agreement is possible, etc.; a deadlock.^[34]
ingénu(e): an innocent young man/woman, used particularly in reference to a theatrical stock character who is entirely virginal and wholesome. L’Ingénu is a famous novella written by Voltaire.

J[edit]

j’accuse: «I accuse»; used generally in reference to a political or social indictment (alluding to J’Accuse…!, Émile Zola’s exposé of the Dreyfus affair, a political scandal that divided France from the 1890s to the early 1900s (decade) and involved the false conviction for treason in 1894 of Alfred Dreyfus, a young French artillery officer of Jewish background).
j’adoube: In chess, an expression, said discreetly, that signals the intention to straighten the pieces without committing to move or capturing the first one touched as per the game’s rules; lit. «I adjust», from adouber, to dub (the action of knighting someone).
je ne regrette rien: «I regret nothing» (from the title of a popular song sung by Édith Piaf: Non, je ne regrette rien). Also the phrase the UK’s then Chancellor of the Exchequer Norman Lamont chose to use to describe his feelings over the events of September 16, 1992 (‘Black Wednesday’).
je ne sais quoi: lit. «I-don’t-know-what»: an indescribable or indefinable ‘something’ that distinguishes the object in question from others that are superficially similar.
jeu d’esprit: lit. «play of spirit»: a witty, often light-hearted, comment or composition
jeunesse dorée: lit. «gilded youth»; name given to a body of young dandies, also called the Muscadins, who, after the fall of Robespierre, fought against the Jacobins. Today used for youthful offspring, particularly if bullying and vandalistic, of the affluent.^[35]
joie de vivre: «joy of life/living».

L[edit]

l’appel du vide: lit. «call of the void»; used to refer to intellectual suicidal thoughts, or the urge to engage in self-destructive (suicidal) behaviors during everyday life. Examples include thinking about swerving in to the opposite lane while driving, or feeling the urge to jump off a cliff edge while standing on it. These thoughts are not accompanied by emotional distress.
laissez-faire: lit. «let do»; often used within the context of economic policy or political philosophy, meaning leaving alone, or non-interference. The phrase is the shortcut of Laissez faire, laissez passer, a doctrine first supported by the Physiocrats in the 18th century. The motto was invented by Vincent de Gournay, and it became popular among supporters of free-trade and economic liberalism. It is also used to describe a parental style in developmental psychology, where the parent(s) does not apply rules or guiding. As per the parental style, it is now one of the major management styles. Used more generally in modern English to describe a particularly casual or «hands-off» attitude or approach to something,
laissez-passer: a travel document, a passport
laissez les bons temps rouler: Cajun expression for «let the good times roll»: not used in proper French, and not generally understood by Francophones outside Louisiana, who would say profitez des bons moments (enjoy the good moments).
lamé: a type of fabric woven or knit with metallic yarns.
lanterne rouge: the last-place finisher in a cycling stage race; most commonly used in connection with the Tour de France.
lèse majesté: an offense against a sovereign power; or, an attack against someone’s dignity or against a custom or institution held sacred (from the Latin crimen laesae maiestatis: the crime of injured majesty).
liaison: a close relationship or connection; an affair. The French meaning is broader; liaison also means «bond»‘ such as in une liaison chimique (a chemical bond)
lingerie: a type of female underwear.
littérateur: an intellectual (can be pejorative in French, meaning someone who writes a lot but does not have a particular skill).^[36]
louche: of questionable taste, but also someone or something that arouses somebody’s suspicions.^[37]
Louis Quatorze: «Louis XIV» (of France), the Sun King, usually a reference to décor or furniture design.
Louis Quinze: «Louis XV» (of France), associated with the rococo style of furniture, architecture and interior decoration.

M[edit]

macramé: coarse lace work made with knotted cords.
madame: a woman brothel-keeper^[38].^[39] In French, a title of respect for an older or married woman (literally «my lady»); sometimes spelled «madam» in English (but never in French).
mademoiselle: lit. «my noble young lady»: young unmarried lady, miss.
malaise: a general sense of depression or unease. Can also be used to denote complacency, or lethargy towards something.
mange tout: a phrase describing snow peas and snap peas (lit. «eat-all», because these peas can be cooked and eaten with their pod).
manqué: unfulfilled; failed.
Mardi gras: Fat Tuesday or Shrove Tuesday, the last day of eating meat before Lent.
marque: a model or brand.
matériel: supplies and equipment, particularly in a military context (French meaning is broader and corresponds more to «hardware»)
mauvais quart d’heure: lit. «bad quarter hour»: a short unpleasant or uncomfortable moment.
mdr: Alt., MDR. Abbreviation in SMS, akin to LOL; for mort de rire (mort, adj. or verb, past tense), or mourir de rire (mourir, verb, infinitive). Lit., as adjective or past tense, dead or died of laughing, so «died laughing» or «dying of laughter»; compare mort de faim for starve.
mélange: a mixture.
mêlée: a confused fight; a struggling crowd. In French also: a rugby scrum.
ménage à trois: lit. «household for three»: a sexual arrangement between three people.^[40]
métier: a field of work or other activity; usually one in which one has special ability or training.
milieu: social environment; setting (has also the meaning of «middle», and organized crime community in French).
milieu intérieur: the extra-cellular fluid environment, and its physiological capacity to ensure protective stability for the tissues and organs of multicellular living organisms.
mirepoix: a cooking mixture of two parts onions and one part each of celery and carrots.
mise en place: an assembly of ingredients, usually set up in small bowls, used to facilitate cooking. This means all the raw ingredients are prepared and ready to go before cooking. Translated, «put in place.»
mise en scène: the process of setting a stage with regard to placement of actors, scenery, properties, etc.; the stage setting or scenery of a play; surroundings, environment.
mise en table: table setting.
montage: editing.
le mot juste: lit. «the just word»; the right word at the right time. French uses it often in the expression chercher le mot juste (to search for the right word).
motif: a recurrent thematic element.
moue: a type of facial expression; pursing together of the lips to indicate dissatisfaction, a pout. See snout reflex.
mousse: a whipped dessert or a hairstyling foam; in French, however, it refers to any type of foam or moss.

N[edit]

naïveté: Lack of sophistication, experience, judgement, or worldliness; artlessness; gullibility; credulity.
né, née: lit. «born»: a man’s/woman’s birth name (maiden name for a woman), e.g., «Martha Washington, née Dandridge.»
n’est-ce pas?: «isn’t it [true]?»; asked rhetorically after a statement, as in «Right?».
noblesse oblige: «nobility obliges»; those granted a higher station in life have a duty to extend (possibly token) favours/courtesies to those in lower stations.
nom de guerre: pseudonym to disguise the identity of a leader of a militant group, literally «war name», used in France for «pseudonym».^[41]
nom de plume: a «back-translation» from the English «pen name»: author’s pseudonym.; Although now used in French as well, the term was coined in English by analogy with nom de guerre.
nonpareil: Unequalled, unrivalled; unparalleled; unique; the modern French equivalent of this expression is sans pareil (literally «without equal»).
nouveau (pl. nouveaux; fem. nouvelle; fem. pl. nouvelles): new.
nouveau riche: lit. «newly rich»; used to refer particularly to those living a garish lifestyle with their newfound wealth; see also arriviste and parvenu.
nouvelle vague: lit. «new wave.»; Used for stating a new way or a new trend of something. Originally marked a new style of French filmmaking in the late 1950s and early 1960s, reacting against films seen as too literary.

O[edit]

objet d’art: a work of art, commonly a painting or sculpture; also a utilitarian object displayed for its aesthetic qualities
œuvre: «work», in the sense of an artist’s work; by extension, an artist’s entire body of work.
opéra bouffe: comedy, satire, parody or farce.
outré: exceeding the lines of propriety; eccentric in behavior or appearance in an inappropriate way

P[edit]

pain au chocolat: lit. «bread with chocolate.» Despite the name, it is not made of bread but puff pastry with chocolate inside. The term chocolatine is used in some Francophone areas (especially the South-West) and sometimes in English.
pain aux raisins: raisin bread.
panache: verve; flamboyance.
papier-mâché: lit. «chewed paper»; a craft medium using paper and paste.
par avion: by aircraft. In English, specifically by air mail, from the phrase found on air mail envelopes.
par excellence: better than all the others, quintessential.^[42]
parc fermé: lit. «closed park». A secure area at a Grand Prix circuit where the cars may be stored overnight.
parkour: urban street sport involving climbing and leaping, using buildings, walls, curbs to ricochet off much as if one were on a skateboard, often in follow-the-leader style. Originally a phonetic form of the French word parcours, which means «a run, a route» Also known as, or the predecessor to, «free running», developed by Sébastien Foucan.
parole: 1) (in linguistics) speech, more specifically the individual, personal phenomenon of language; see langue and parole. 2) (in criminal justice) conditional early release from prison; see parole.
parvenu: a social upstart.
pas de deux: lit. «step for two»; in ballet, a dance or figure for two performers, a duet; also a close relationship between two people.^[43]
pas de trois: lit. «step for three»; in ballet, a dance or figure for three performers.
passe-partout: a document or key that allows the holder to travel without hindrance from the authorities or enter any location.
pastiche: a derivative work; an imitation.
patois: a dialect; jargon.^[44]
père: lit. «father», used after a man’s surname to distinguish a father from a son, as in Alexandre Dumas, père.
peloton: in road cycling, the main group of riders in a race.
petit pois: small peas, often sold in the frozen food aisle.
petite bourgeoisie: often anglicised as «petty bourgeoisie», used to designate the middle class.
la petite mort: lit. «the little death»; an expression for the weakening or loss of consciousness following an intense orgasm.
Pied-Noir (plural Pieds-Noirs): lit. «black foot», a European Algerian in the pre-independence state.
pied-à-terre (also pied à terre): lit. «foot-on-the-ground»; a place to stay, generally small and applied to a secondary residence in a city.^[45]
pince-nez: lit. «nose-pincher», a type of spectacles without temple arms.
piste: lit. «trail» or «track»; often used referring to skiing at a ski area (on piste) versus skiing in the back country (off piste).
plage: beach, especially a fashionable seaside resort.
plat du jour: lit. «dish of the day»; a dish served in a restaurant on a particular day but separate from the regular menu.
plongeur (fem. plongeuse): a male (or female) dishwasher in a professional kitchen.
plus ça change, plus c’est la même chose (or plus ça change, plus c’est pareil) (often abbreviated to just plus ça change): the more things change, the more they stay the same. An aphorism coined by Jean-Baptiste Alphonse Karr.
point d’appui: a location where troops assemble prior to a battle. While this figurative meaning also exists in French, the first and literal meaning of point d’appui is a fixed point from which a person or thing executes a movement (such as a footing in climbing or a pivot).
porte-cochère: an architectural term referring to a kind of porch or portico-like structure.
poseur: lit. «poser»: a person who pretends to be something he is not; an affected or insincere person; a wannabe.
pot-au-feu: stew, soup.
pour encourager les autres: lit. «to encourage others»; said of an excessive punishment meted out as an example, to deter others. The original is from Voltaire’s Candide and referred to the execution of Admiral John Byng.^[46]
pourboire: lit. «for drink»; gratuity, tip; donner un pourboire: to tip.
prairie: lit. «meadow»; expansive natural meadows of long grass.
prêt-à-porter: lit. «ready to wear»; clothing off the shelf, in contrast to haute couture.
prie-dieu: lit. «pray [to] God»; a type of prayer desk.
prix fixe: lit. «fixed price»; a menu on which multi-course meals with only a few choices are charged at a fixed price.
protégé (fem. protégée): lit. «protected»; a man/woman who receives support from an influential mentor.^[47]
provocateur: an agitator, a polemicist.
purée: lit. a smooth, creamy substance made of liquidized or crushed fruit or vegetables.

Q[edit]

Quai d’Orsay: address of the French foreign ministry in Paris, used to refer to the ministry itself.
Quatorze juillet: «14th of July», usually called Bastille Day in English. The beginning of the French Revolution in 1789; used to refer to the Revolution itself and its ideals. It is the French National Day.
quelle bonne idée!: What a good idea!
quel dommage!: What a sad thing! (can be used sarcastically).
quelle horreur!: What a horrible thing! (can be used sarcastically).
quelle surprise!: What a surprising thing! (mostly used sarcastically)

R[edit]

raconteur: a storyteller.^[48]
raison d’être: «reason for being»: justification or purpose of existence.
rapprochement: the establishment of cordial relations, often used in diplomacy.^[49]
reconnaissance: scouting, the military exploration outside an area that friendly forces occupy
Renaissance: a historical period or cultural movement of rebirth
refoulement: the expulsion of persons who have the right to be recognised as refugees.^[50]
reportage: reporting; journalism.
répondez s’il-vous-plaît. (RSVP): Please reply. Though francophones may use more usually «prière de répondre» or «je vous prie de bien vouloir répondre», it is common enough.
restaurateur: a restaurant owner.^[51]
Rive Gauche: the left (southern) bank (of the River Seine in Paris). A particular mindset attributed to inhabitants of that area, which includes the Sorbonne
roi fainéant: lit. «do-nothing king»: an expression first used about the kings of France from 670 to 752 (Thierry III to Childeric III), who were puppets of their ministers. The term was later used about other royalty who had been made powerless, also in other countries, but lost its meaning when parliamentarism made all royals powerless.
roman à clef: lit. «novel with a key»: an account of actual persons, places or events in fictional guise.^[52]
roué: an openly debauched, lecherous older man.
roux: a cooked mixture of flour and melted butter (or other fat) used as a base in soups and gravies.

S[edit]

sacre bleu: lit. «sacred blue»: a dated French minced oath originating from the blasphemous «sacre dieu!» («Holy god!»). Meant as a cry of surprise or happiness.; French orthography is sacrebleu in one word.
sang-froid: lit. «cold blood»: coolness and composure under strain; stiff upper lip. Also pejorative in the phrase meurtre de sang-froid («cold-blooded murder»).
sans: without.^[53]
sans-culottes: lit. «without knee-breeches», a name the insurgent crowd in the streets of Paris gave to itself during the French Revolution, because they usually wore pantaloons (full-length pants or trousers) instead of the chic knee-length culotte of the nobles. In modern use: holding strong republican views.
sauté: lit. «jumped», from the past participle of the verb sauter (to jump), which can be used as an adjective or a noun; quickly fried in a small amount of oil, stir-fried. ex: sauté of veau.
savant: lit. «knowing»: a wise or learned person; in English, one exceptionally gifted in a narrow skill.
savoir-faire: lit. «know how to do»; to respond appropriately to any situation.
savoir-vivre: fact of following conventional norms within a society; etiquette (etiquette also comes from a French word, étiquette).
sobriquet: an assumed name, a nickname (often used in a pejorative way in French).^[54]
soi-disant: lit. «oneself saying»; so-called; self-described.
soigné: fashionable; polished.
soirée: an evening party.
sommelier: a wine steward.
soupçon: a very small amount. (In French, it can also mean «suspicion».)
soupe du jour: lit. «soup of the day», the particular kind of soup offered that day.
succès d’estime: lit. «success of esteem; critical success»; sometimes used pejoratively in English.^[55]

T[edit]

tableau: chalkboard. The meaning is broader in French: all types of board (chalkboard, whiteboard, notice board …). Refers also to a painting (see tableau vivant, below) or a table (chart).
tableau vivant: lit. «living picture»; the term describes a striking group of suitably costumed actors or artist’s models, carefully posed and often theatrically lit.
tenné: orange-brown, «rust» colour, not commonly used outside heraldic emblazoning.
tête-à-tête: lit. «head to head»; an intimate get-together or private conversation between two people.
toilette: the process of dressing or grooming. Also refers in French, when plural (les toilettes), to the toilet room.
torsades de pointes: lit. «twisting around a point», used to describe a particular type of heart rhythm.
touché: lit. «touched» or «hit!»: acknowledgment of an effective counterpoint or verbal riposte; comes from terminology in the sport of fencing. In French has a broader meaning (touched) as «emotionally touched».
tour de force (also tour-de-force): lit. «feat of strength»: a masterly or brilliant stroke, creation, effect, or accomplishment.^[56]^[57]
tout court: lit. «all short»: typically used in philosophy to mean «nothing else», in contrast to a more detailed or extravagant alternative. For instance, «Kant does not believe that morality derives from practical reason as applied to moral ends, but from practical reason tout court».
tout de suite: right now, immediately. Often mangled as «toot sweet».
tranche: lit. «slice»: one of several different classes of securities involved a single financial transaction.^[58]
triage: during a medical emergency or disaster, the process of determining the priority of medical treatment or transportation based on the severity of the patient’s condition. In recent years, in British English usage, the term has also been used in the sense of to screen or address something at the point of contact, before it requires escalation.

tricoteuse: a woman who knits and gossips; from the women who knitted and sewed while watching executions of prisoners of the French Revolution.
trompe-l’œil: lit. «trick the eye»; photographic realism in fine-art painting or decorative painting in a home.
trou de loup: lit. «wolf hole»; a kind of booby trap.
trousseau

The wardrobe of a bride, including the wedding dress or similar clothing, or the bride’s belongings
A dowry
A hope chest, glory box or its contents

V[edit]

va-et-vient: lit. «goes and comes»; the continual coming and going of people to and from a place.^[59]
venu(e): an invited man/woman for a show, or «one who has come»; the term is unused in modern French, though it can still be heard in a few expressions like bienvenu/e (literally «well come»: welcome) or le premier venu (anyone; literally, «the first who came»). Almost exclusively used in modern English as a noun meaning the location where a meeting or event is taking place.
vin de pays: lit. «country wine»; wine of a lower designated quality than appellation contrôlée.

vinaigrette: diminutive of vinaigre (vinegar): salad dressing of oil and vinegar.
vis-à-vis (also vis-a-vis): lit. «face to face [with]»: in comparison with or in relation to; opposed to. From vis, an obsolete word for «face», replaced by visage in contemporary French.^[60] In French, this is also a real estate vocabulary word, meaning that your windows and your neighbours’ are within sighting distance (more precisely, that you can see inside of their home).
vive […]!: «Long live …!»; lit. «Live»; as in «Vive la France !», Vive la République !, Vive la Résistance !, Vive le Canada !, or Vive le Québec libre ! (long live free Quebec, a sovereigntist slogan famously used by French President Charles de Gaulle in 1967 in Montreal). Unlike viva (Italian and Spanish) or vivat (Latin), it cannot be used alone; it needs a complement.
vive la différence!: lit. «[long] live the difference»; originally referring to the difference between the sexes; the phrase may be also used to celebrate the difference between any two groups of people (or simply the general diversity of individuals).
voilà !: lit. «see there»; in French it can mean simply «there it is»; in English it is generally restricted to a triumphant revelation.
volte-face: frenchified form of Italian volta faccia, lit. «turn face», an about-face, a maneuver in marching; figuratively, a complete reversal of opinion or position.
voulez-vous coucher avec moi (ce soir)?: «Do you want to sleep with me (tonight)?» or more appropriately, «Will you spend the night with me?» In French, coucher is vulgar in this sense. In English it appears in Tennessee Williams’s play A Streetcar Named Desire, as well as in the lyrics of a popular song by Labelle, «Lady Marmalade.»
voyeur: lit. «someone who sees»; a Peeping Tom.^[61]

Z[edit]

zut alors!: «Darn it!» or the British expression «Blimey!» This is a general exclamation (vulgar equivalent is merde alors ! «Damn it!»). Just plain zut is also in use, often repeated for effect: zut, zut et zut ! There is an album by Frank Zappa, punningly titled Zoot Allures. The phrase is also used on the Saturday Night Live Weekend Update sketch by recurring character Jean K. Jean, played by Kenan Thompson as well as by John Goodman’s Dan Conner in an episode of Roseanne when Roseanne dresses up in a sexy outfit and has a boudoir photo taken of her as a birthday gift for her husband.

Not used as such in French[edit]

Through the evolution of the language, many words and phrases are no longer used in modern French. Also there are expressions that, even though grammatically correct, do not have the same meaning in French as the English words derived from them. Some older word usages still appear in Quebec French.

à la mode: fashionable; in the US it also describes a dessert with ice cream (as in «apple pie à la mode») or, in some US regions, with cheese. In French, it mainly means «fashionable», «trendy», but is occasionally a culinary term usually meaning something cooked with carrots and onions (as in bœuf à la mode). It can also mean «in the style or manner [of]»^[62] (as in tripes à la mode de Caen), and in this acceptation is similar to the shorter expression «à la». The British English meaning and usage is the same as in French.
accoutrement: personal military or fighting armaments worn about one’s self; has come to mean the accompanying items available to pursue a mission, or just accessories in general. In French, means a funny or ridiculous clothing; often a weird disguise or a getup, though it can be said also for people with bad taste in clothing.
appliqué: an inlaid or attached decorative feature. Lit. «applied», though this meaning does not exist as such in French. However «appliqué inversé» exists and has the same meaning as a reverse appliqué. Also an «applique murale» is a decorative light fixture attached on a wall.
après-ski: lit. «after skiing», socializing after a ski session; in French, this word refers to boots used to walk in snow (e.g. MoonBoots). Commonly used for the same thing as in English in Quebec.
arrêt à bon temps: A counterattack that attempts to take advantage of an uncertain attack in fencing. Though grammatically correct, this expression is not used in French. The term arrêt exists in fencing, with the meaning of a «simple counteroffensive action»; the general meaning is «a stop». A related French expression: s’arrêter à temps (to stop in time).
artiste: a skilled performer, a person with artistic pretensions. In French: an artist. Can be used ironically for a person demonstrating little professional skill or passion in both languages.
au naturel: nude; in French, literally, in a natural manner or way (au is the contraction of à le, masculine form of à la). It means «in an unaltered way» and can be used either for people or things. For people, it rather refers to a person who does not use make-up or artificial manners (un entretien au naturel = a backstage interview). For things, it means that they have not been altered. Often used in cooking, like thon au naturel: canned tuna without any spices or oil. Also in heraldry, meaning «in natural colours», especially flesh colour, which is not one of the «standard» colours of heraldry.
auteur: A film director, specifically one who controls most aspects of a film, or other controller of an artistic situation. The English connotation derives from French film theory. It was popularized in the journal Cahiers du cinéma: auteur theory maintains that directors like Hitchcock exert a level of creative control equivalent to the author of a literary work. In French, the word means «author», but some expressions like cinéma d’auteur are also in use.
bête noire: a scary or unpopular person, idea, or thing, or the archetypal scary monster in a story; literally «black beast.» In French, être la bête noire de quelqu’un («to be somebody’s black beast») means that you’re particularly hated by this person or this person has a strong aversion against you, regardless of whether you’re scary or not. The dictionary of the Académie française admits its use only for people, though other dictionaries admit it for things or ideas too. It also means that one is repeatedly defeated by a person, who is thus considered their archenemy (for instance, «Nadal is the bête noire of Roger Federer»).
boutique: a clothing store, usually selling designer/one off pieces rather than mass-produced clothes. Can also describe a quirky and/or upmarket hotel. In French, it can describe any shop, clothing or otherwise. The expression hôtel-boutique can be used to refer to upmarket hotels, but the word is recent and not as widespread as the equivalent expression boutique hotel.
boutonnière: In English, a boutonnière is a flower placed in the buttonhole of a suit jacket. In French, a boutonnière is the buttonhole itself. Yet the French expression «Une fleur à la boutonnière» has an equivalent meaning.
c’est magnifique, mais ce n’est pas la guerre: «it is magnificent, but it is not war» — quotation from Marshal Pierre Bosquet commenting on the charge of the Light Brigade. Unknown quotation in French.
cause célèbre: An issue arousing widespread controversy or heated public debate, lit. ‘famous cause’. It is correct grammatically, but the expression is not used in French.
chacun à son goût: the correct expressions in French are chacun ses goûts / à chacun ses goûts / à chacun son goût: «to each his/her own taste(s)».
chanson: a classical «art song», equiv. to the German Lied or the Italian aria; or, in Russian, a cabaret-style sung narrative, usually rendered by a guttural male voice with guitar accompaniment. In French, it can be used to refer to any song, but it also refers to the same music genre as in English (someone practicing this genre being generally called a chansonnier in Quebec, especially if they sing at a restaurant or cabaret).
château: a manor house or a country house of nobility or gentry, with or without fortifications, originally—and still most frequently—in French-speaking regions. The word château is also used for castles in French, so where clarification is needed, the term château fort («strong castle») is used to describe a castle.
chef: in English, a person who cooks professionally for other people. In French the word means «head» or «chief»; a professional cook is a cuisinier (lit. «cook»), chef-cuisinier referring to a head cook. Also, sous-chef, the second-in-command, directly under the head chef. Traditionally, chef used to means the head, for example a «couvre-chef» is a headgear, but by extension it’s often used in job titles, military ranks, for a person in charge or who leads a group of people: «chef d’État» (lit. «Head of State» and «Chief of State»), «chef d’entreprise» («Business executive»), «chef d’orchestre» (Conductor of an Orchestra), «sergeant-chef» (Staff Sergeant), «chef de gare» (stationmaster), «chef de famille» (head of household), etc. More casually in a work context, a chef is a boss.
cinq à sept: extraconjugal affair between five and seven pm. In French, though it can also mean this, it primarily means any relaxing time with friends between the end of work and the beginning of the marital obligations. In Quebec French, it is also used as a synonym for «Happy Hour» by bars and restaurants that serve discounted drinks after working hours.
claque: a group of admirers; in French, «la claque» is a group of people paid to applaud or disturb a piece at the theatre, though the common meaning of «claque» is «a slap»; clique is used in this sense (but in a pejorative way).
connoisseur: an expert in wines, fine arts, or other matters of culture; a person of refined taste. It is spelled connaisseur in modern French (lit. «someone who knows»).
corsage: A bouquet of flowers worn on a woman’s dress or worn around her wrist. In French, it refers to a woman’s chest (from shoulder to waist) and, by extension, the part of a woman’s garment that covers this area.
coup de main (pl. coups de main): a surprise attack. In French, [donner] un coup de main means «[to give] a hand» (to give assistance). Even if the English meaning exists as well (as in faire le coup de main), it is old-fashioned.
coup d’état (pl. coups d’état): a sudden change in government by force; literally «hit (blow) of state.» French uses the capital É, because the use of a capital letter alters the meaning of the word (État: a State, as in a country; état: a state of being). It also cannot be shortened as coup as is often the case in English- because this literally means a «hit» in French, but can be used figuratively to mean many more things.
début: first public performance of an entertainment personality or group. In French, it means «beginning.» The English meaning of the word exists only when in the plural form: [faire] ses débuts [sur scène] (to make one’s débuts on the stage). The English meaning and usage also extends to sports to denote a player who is making their first appearance for a team or at an event.
décolletage: a low-cut neckline, cleavage. In French it means: 1. action of lowering a female garment’s neckline; 2. Agric.: cutting leaves from some cultivated roots such as beets, carrots, etc.; 3. Tech. Operation consisting of making screws, bolts, etc. one after another out of a single bar of metal on a parallel lathe. A low-cut neckline, or its shape, would in French be called un décolleté (noun and adjective): un décolleté profond, a deep décolletage; une robe très décolletée, a dress with very low neckline.
démarche: a decisive step. In French, it means a preparing step (often used in the plural form), a specific set of steps to get a specific result (can be used in the singular form, sometimes the expression «marche à suivre» (lit. «step to follow») will be preferred), or a distinctive way of walking.
dépanneur: a neighbourhood general/convenience store, term used in eastern Canada (often shortened to dép or dep). This term is commonly used in Canadian French; however, in France, it means a repairman or tow truck operator. In France, a convenience store would be a supérette or épicerie [de quartier].
émigré: one who has emigrated for political reasons. French also use the word exilé (exiled) or réfugié (refugee) or even «exilé politique» or «réfugié politique».
encore: A request to repeat a performance, as in Encore!, lit. ‘again’; also used to describe additional songs played at the end of a gig. Francophones would say « Une autre ! » (‘Another one!’) or «Bis !» to request « un rappel » or « un bis ».
en masse: in a mass or group, all together. In French, masse refers only to a physical mass, whether for people or objects. It cannot be used for something immaterial, like, for example, the voice: «they all together said ‘get out'» would be translated as ils ont dit ‘dehors’ en chœur ([like a chorus]). Also, en masse refers to numerous people or objects (a crowd or a mountain of things). In colloquial Québécois French, it means «a bunch» (as in il y avait du monde en masse, «there was a bunch of people»).
en suite: as a set (not to be confused with ensuite, meaning «then»). Can refer, in particular, to hotel rooms with attached private bathroom, especially in Britain where hotels without private facilities are more common than in North America. In French, suite, when in the context of a hotel, already means several rooms following each other. J’ai loué une suite au Ritz would be translated as «I rented a suite at the Ritz.» En suite is not grammatically incorrect in French, but it is not an expression in itself and it is not used. Also used in British English to denote a bathroom that is accessible directly from the master bedroom of a house (usually with a connecting door), rather than by a separate entrance.
entrée: lit. «entrance»; in French, the first dish that starts a meal, i.e. the entrance to the meal. It can refer to a set of bites or small snacks, or a small dish served before a main course. The main dish or «plat de résistance» comes after the entrée. In American English, the meaning has migrated to «main dish». In other varieties of English it maintains its French meaning.
épée: a fencing weapon descended from the duelling sword. In French, apart from fencing (the sport) the term is more generic: it means sword.
escritoire: a writing table. It is spelt écritoire in modern French.
exposé: a published exposure of a fraud or scandal (past participle of «to expose»); in French refers to a talk or a report on any kind of subject.
femme: a stereotypically effeminate gay man or lesbian (slang, pronounced as written). In French, femme (pronounced ‘fam’) means «woman.»
fin de siècle: comparable to (but not exactly the same as) turn-of-the-century but with a connotation of decadence, usually applied to the period from 1890 through 1910. In French, it means «end of the century», but it isn’t a recognized expression as such. The French expression «ambiance [de] fin de règne» (lit. «end-of-reign atmosphere») also has a light connotation of boredom and decadence.
forte: a strength, a strong point, typically of a person, from the French fort(e) (strong) and/or Italian forte (strong, esp. «loud» in music) and/or Latin forte (neuter form of fortis, strong). French uses fort(e) for both people and objects.; According to Merriam Webster Dictionary, «In forte we have a word derived from French that in its «strong point» sense has no entirely satisfactory pronunciation. Usage writers have denigrated ‘for-«tA and ‘for-tE because they reflect the influence of the Italian-derived forte. Their recommended pronunciation ‘fort, however, does not exactly reflect French either: the French would write the word le fort and would rhyme it with English for [French doesn’t pronounce the final «t»]. All are standard, however. In British English ‘fo-«tA and ‘fot predominate; ‘for-«tA and for-‘tA are probably the most frequent pronunciations in American English.»; The New Oxford Dictionary of English derives it from fencing. In French, le fort d’une épée is the third of a blade nearer the hilt, the strongest part of the sword used for parrying.

hors d’oeuvre: term used for the snacks served with drinks before a meal. Literally «outside of the work». The French use apéritif to refer to the time before a meal and the drinks consumed during that time, yet «hors d’œuvre» is a synonym of «entrée» in French and means the first dish that starts a meal. At home in family circles it means more specifically seasoned salads taken as a starter. In Québécois French, apéritif refers to the drink only, and hors-d’œuvre (usually plural) refers to a set of bites, while an entrée is a small dish (an entrée can be made as hors-d’œuvres, but not all of them are).
la sauce est tout: «The sauce is everything!» or «The secret’s in the sauce!» Tagline used in a 1950s American television commercial campaign for an American line of canned food products. Grammatically correct but not used in French, where one might say Tout est dans la sauce or C’est la sauce qui fait (passer) le poisson.
Lavatoire or Lavatory: A once commonly used British term for a toilet or water closet. Before the age of the internet, it was commonly believed, and widely taught in schools in Britain, that the word Toilet was a rather vulgar, impure, corruption of the French word «Toilettes» and that Lavatory was the correct expression to use because it was much closer in meaning to the French the word it was derived from, «Lavatoire», which was supposed to mean «to wash, or to clean, yourself». Actually, though the word Lavatoire does exist in French, it never meant a toilet or a bathroom. The Lavatoire was the holy stone upon which the bodies of ecclesiastics, priest and members of the clergy, were once washed after their deaths, in order to prepare them for the afterlife, for their journey to heaven.
marquee: the sign above a theater that tells you what is playing. From marquise, which means not only a marchioness but also an awning. Theater buildings are generally old and nowadays there is never such a sign above them; there is only the advertisement for the play (l’affiche). In English, means a temporary structure (often made of canvas or similar material) which is erected to host an event outdoors, especially in the UK, where such events can often be affected by weather conditions (pronounced mar-key).
nostalgie de la boue: «yearning for the mud»; attraction to what is unworthy, crude or degrading.^[63] Though grammatically correct, it is not used in French.
objet trouvé: an ordinary object, such as a piece of driftwood, a shell, or a manufactured article, that is treated as an objet d’art because it is aesthetically pleasing.^[64] In French, les objets trouvés, short for le bureau des objets trouvés, means the lost-and-found, the lost property.
outré: out of the ordinary, unusual. In French, it means outraged (for a person) or exaggerated, extravagant, overdone (for a thing, esp. a praise, an actor’s style of acting, etc.); in that second meaning, belongs to «literary» style.
passé: out of fashion. The correct expression in French is passé de mode. Passé means past, passed, or (for a colour) faded.
peignoir: a woman’s dressing gown. It means bathrobe. In French, both peignoir and robe de chambre are used interchangeably for a dressing gown regardless of sex, though the latter is generally considered formal and the former is generally seen as colloquial. A bathrobe (for either sex, in absorbent material) is un peignoir de bain.
pièce d’occasion: «occasional piece»; item written or composed for a special occasion. In French, it means «second-hand hardware.» Can be shortened as pièce d’occas‘ or even occas‘ (pronounced /okaz/).
portemanteau (pl. portemanteaux): in English a portmanteau is a large piece of luggage for clothes that opens (like a book or a diptych) into two parts. From this literal sense, Lewis Carroll, in his novel Through the Looking Glass playfully coined a further figurative sense for portmanteau meaning a word that fuses two or more words or parts of words to give a combined meaning. In French, lit. a ‘coat-carrier’, originally a person who carried the royal coat or dress train, now a large suitcase; more often, a clothes hanger. The equivalent of the English/ Lewis-Carroll portemanteau is un mot-valise (lit. a suitcase word). «Brexit» and «emoticon» are modern examples of portmanteau words.
potpourri: medley, mixture; French write it pot-pourri, literally ‘rotten pot’: primarily a pot in which different kinds of flowers or spices are put to dry for years for the scent.
précis: a concise summary. In French, when talking about a school course, it means an abridged book about the matter. Literally, précis means precise, accurate.
première: refers to the first performance of a play, a film, etc. «La première» is used in same way in French, but it more generally means «the first».
raisonneur: a type of author intrusion in which a writer inserts a character to argue the author’s viewpoint; alter ego, sometimes called ‘author avatar’. In French, a raisonneur is a character in a play who stands for morality and reason, i.e., not necessarily the author’s point of view. The first meaning of this word though is a man (fem. raisonneuse) who overdoes reasonings, who tires by objecting with numerous arguments to every order.
recherché: lit. searched; obscure; pretentious. In French, means ‘sophisticated’ or ‘delicate’, or simply ‘studied’, without the negative connotations of the English.
rendezvous: lit. «present yourself» or «proceed to»; a meeting, appointment, or date in French. In English, it generally endorses a mysterious overtone and refers to a one-on-one meeting with someone for another purpose than a date. Always hyphenated in French: rendez-vous. Its only accepted abbreviation in French is RDV.
reprise: repetition of previous music in a suite, programme, etc. and also applied to an actor who resumes a role that they have played previously. In French, it may mean an alternate version of a piece of music, or a cover version, or the rebroadcast of a show, piece or movie that was originally broadcast a while ago (although the term rediffusion is generally preferred, especially when talking about something on television). To express the repetition of a previous musical theme, French would exclusively use the Italian term coda.
résumé: in North American English, a document listing one’s qualifications for employment. In French, it means summary; French speakers would use instead curriculum vitæ, or its abbreviation, C.V. (like most other English speakers).
risqué (also risque): sexually suggestive; in French, the meaning of risqué is «risky», with no sexual connotation. Francophones use instead osé (lit. «daring») or sometimes dévergondé (very formal language). Osé, unlike dévergondé, cannot be used for people themselves, only for things (such as pictures) or attitudes.
rouge (lit. «red»): 1) a rouge is red makeup, also called blusher. Rouge à lèvres is French for «lipstick», even if the lipstick is not red at all. The French equivalent to the English meaning is «fard à joues»; 2) in Canadian football, a rouge is awarded when the ball is kicked into the end zone by any legal means, other than a successful field goal, and the receiving team does not return or kick the ball out of its end zone.
séance: a gathering, usually using a ‘medium’, attempting to communicate with the dead. In French, the word means ‘sitting’ and usually refers to any kind of meeting or session.
table d’hôte (pl. tables d’hôte): in English, when used it usually refers to type of meal: a full-course meal offered at a fixed price. However, in French, it refers to a type of lodging: the closest English equivalent would be «a bed & breakfast» or «B&B.» The origin of the meaning (for French speakers) is that at a table d’hôte (literally «table of the house» or «table of the host»), unlike at a full-service purpose-built hotel, all patrons eat together at the host’s table, whatever the family have prepared for themselves (typically traditional regional dishes). Indeed, in France today a lodging labeled «table d’hôte» might perhaps not even offer food; the appellation meaning what an English-speaker would think of as a «bed & breakfast -style» family-home lodging (as opposed to a purpose-built hotel). In Quebec, table d’hôte generally has the same meaning as in English, the expression couette et café (lit. «duvet and coffee») is generally used to talk about B&B style accommodations, where the English expression is not used.
tableau vivant (pl. tableaux vivants, often shortened as tableau): in drama, a scene where actors remain motionless as if in a picture. Tableau means painting, tableau vivant, living painting. In French, it is an expression used in body painting.
touché: acknowledgment of an effective counterpoint. In French, used for «emotionally touched».
vignette: a brief description; a short scene. In French, it is a small picture or a thumbnail. By extension a vignette is the name of a compulsory road tax in the form of a small sticker affixed to a vehicle windscreen, which is now also used in several European countries.

Found only in English[edit]

aide-de-camp: «camp assistant»; in the army, a military assistant to a senior military officer (heads of State are considered military officers because of their status as head of the army). In Canada, it may also refer to the honorary position a person holds as a personal assistant to a high civil servant. It exists in French too but is written aide de camp (without any hyphens).
apprise: «to inform»; used to substitute the verb to inform when the information is crucial. Its French meaning is the feminine past participle of to learn [apprendre]. In English, when followed by an object it is used with the preposition of. Example without object: Please, apprise me. Example with object: he apprised of it.
cinquefoil: five-petal, five-leaf flower of the genus Potentilla, family Rosaceae; also a circular 5-lobed ornamental design. Spelled quintefeuille in French.
cri de cœur: «cry from the heart»: an impassioned outcry, as of entreaty or protest. In French, the exact expression is cri du cœur.
demi-monde: a class of women of ill repute; a fringe group or subculture. Fell out of use in the French language in the 19th century. Frenchmen still use une demi-mondaine to qualify a woman that lives (exclusively or partially) off the commerce of her charms but in a high-life style.
double entendre: a figure of speech wherein a word or phrases can be taken to have two distinct coherent meanings, most often in a fashion that is suggestive and/or ironic. «Entendre» is an infinitive verb («to hear»), not a noun; a correct rendering would be «à double entente», an adjectival phrase meaning «of a double understanding or double interpretation» (literally, «with a double hearing»). The modern French phrase is «à double sens».
in lieu (of): «in place (of)»; partially translated from the existing French phrase au lieu (de).
léger de main (legerdemain): «light of hand»: sleight of hand, usually in the context of deception or the art of stage magic tricks. Meaningless in French; the equivalent is un tour de passe-passe.
maître d’: translates literally as master o’. The French term for head waiter (the manager of the service side of a restaurant) is maître d’hôtel (literally «master of the house» or «master of the establishment»); French never uses «d‘» stand-alone. Most often used in American English and its usage in the UK is rare.
negligée: A robe or a dressing gown, usually of sheer or soft fabric for women, or a nightdress. As with lingerie, the usage of the word suggests the garment is alluring or fancy. French uses négligé (masculine form) or nuisette. In French, the word négligée qualifies a woman who neglects her appearance.
succès de scandale: «Success through scandal»; Francophones might use succès par médisance.
voir dire: a trial within a trial, or (in America) jury selection (Law French). Literally «to speak the truth.»^[65] (Anglo-Norman voir [truth] is etymologically unrelated to the modern French voir [to see].)^[66] In modern American court procedure, the examination of prospective jurors for their qualification to serve, including inherent biases, views and predelictions; during this examination, each prospective juror must «speak the truth» so that counsel and the court may decide whether they should remain on the jury or be excused. In England and Wales, the expression is used to refer to a «trial within a trial», during which a judge hears evidence in the absence of the jury, typically to decide whether a certain piece of evidence should be allowed to be presented to the jury or not. For example, a judge might hold a «voir dire» to determine whether a confession has been extracted from a defendant by an unfair inducement in order to decide whether the jury should hear evidence of the confession or not.

French phrases in international air-sea rescue[edit]

International authorities have adopted a number of words and phrases from French for use by speakers of all languages in voice communications during air-sea rescues. Note that the «phonetic» versions of spelling are presented as shown and not the IPA.

SECURITAY: (sécurité, «safety») the following is a safety message or warning, the lowest level of danger.
PAN PAN: (panne, «breakdown») the following is a message concerning a danger to a person or ship, the next level of danger.
MAYDAY: ([venez] m’aider, come to help me»; aidez-moi means «help me») the following is a message of extreme urgency, the highest level of danger. (MAYDAY is used on voice channels for the same uses as SOS on Morse channels.)
SEELONCE: (silence, «silence») keep this channel clear for air-sea rescue communications.
SEELONCE FEE NEE: (silence fini, «silence is over») this channel is now available again.
PRU DONCE: (prudence, «prudence») silence partially lifted, channel may be used again for urgent non-distress communication.
MAY DEE CAL: (médical, «medical») medical assistance needed.

It is a serious breach in most countries, and in international zones, to use any of these phrases without justification.

See Mayday (distress signal) for a more detailed explanation.

References[edit]

^ «I like my nature programmes à la Attenborough, where Nature is the subject matter and the presenter remains unobtrusive,» Christina Odone, «Moving experiences should be private», The Daily Telegraph, September 12, 1996.
^ See the definition given in CNRTL’s Trésor de la langue française: «Subst. masc. Boisson généralement alcoolisée, réputée stimulante pour l’appétit», CNRTL.
^ «The beau idéal: a style for the Empire». Les Arts Décoratifs — Site officiel. Retrieved November 21, 2022.
^ The New Fowler’s Modern English Usage, third edition, edited by R. W. Burchfield, Clarendon Press, Oxford, 1996, p. 98–99.
^ «Except for the strong possibility that – like former Bishop Roddy Wright of Argyll and the Isles – I would, in fact, be breaking off to pen a billet-doux to a divorcée of the parish, or a furtive birthday card to my secret teenage son,» Mark Lawson, «The boy who would be Pope», The Guardian Weekly, September 21, 1996.
^ Eric Partridge: Dictionary of Slang and Unconventional English, 1951
^ «ça ne fait rien». Lawless French. Retrieved December 31, 2016.
^ «C’est la guerre Definition & Meaning — Merriam-Webster».
^ «C’est la vie Definition & Meaning — Merriam-Webster».
^ «Step forward Naomi Campbell, supermodel, sometime novelist and now chanteuse, whose La La La song has sold 1.7 m copies in Japan alone,» John Harlow, «Pop world laments dying scream of the teenyboppers chorus», The Sunday Times, August 18, 1996.
^ «Definition of CHANTEUSE». www.merriam-webster.com. Retrieved August 20, 2019.
^ «CHANTEUSE | definition in the Cambridge English Dictionary». dictionary.cambridge.org. Retrieved August 20, 2019.
^ Harper, Douglas. «chanteuse | Origin and meaning of chanteuse by Online Etymology Dictionary». www.etymonline.com. Retrieved August 20, 2019.
^ The meaning and origin of the expression: Cherchez la femme, The Phrase Finder.
^ «Bush and his confrères are personally implicated in the current wave of corporate scandals,» Jonathan Freedland, «How British Could Lose», The Guardian, July 24, 2002
^ «Altogether it was a fabulous coup de théâtre and a stunning deus ex machina,» A. A. Gill, «Hello dollies, everywhere», The Sunday Times, News Review, October 27, 1996.
^ «Mother, 14, is denied school crèche», The Times, August 31, 1996.
^ «cul-de-sac — Definition of cul-de-sac in US English by Oxford Dictionaries». Oxford Dictionaries — English. Archived from the original on November 7, 2014. Retrieved April 14, 2018.
^ [1] (in French)
^ «Working during the summer is de rigueur for the majority of students,» Peter and Lynne Boundy, «When parents are on the breadline», The Times, September 10, 1996.
^ «a sweet but intoxicating digestif», Satyr, «Into the mouths of babes and sucklings», The Observer, Business, August 18, 1996.
^ «But then the dossier will be buried and with it the real truth,» Roger Faligot, «Grave issue that won’t die down», The European, August 8–14, 1996.
^ «The late Elizabeth David, the doyenne of cookery writers, must be turning in her grave,» Evening Standard, London’s Diary, September 12, 1996.
^ «Vanity Fair, that glossy barometer of ‘the importance of being fabulous’, is planning an extended spread on London as the ‘happening’ city du jour,» Douglas Kennedy, «We’re finally speaking their language», The Sunday Times, The Culture, October 27, 1996.
^ «I have always seen a great similarity in the turn of our minds. We are each of an unsocial, taciturn disposition, unwilling to speak, unless we expect to say something that will amaze the whole room, and be handed down to posterity with all the éclat of a proverb,» Jane Austen, Pride and Prejudice, 1813.
^ «Definition of EPATER LES BOURGEOIS». www.m-w.com. Retrieved April 14, 2018.
^ Decadence Archived 2015-03-25 at the Wayback Machine.
^ «Ruby day is a demi-clad femme fatale in pantomime boy’s clothing, channelling Liza Minelli and EF Benson’s Quaint Irene – as alluring to women as she is to men. You can just about see how it might épater la bourgeoisie, without feeling for a second any outrage is justified,» Rowan Pelling, «How is this painting ‘pornographic’ and ‘disgusting’?», The Guardian, July 8, 2014.
^ «May I remind your readers that planning permission has not yet been sought for the [Foster] tower, nor is it a fait accompli,» Paul Drury (English Heritage), Letters to the Editor, Independent on Sunday, August 18, 1996
^ Evelyn Waugh was very close to not being asked back to La Mauresque after one grave faux pas that Maugham, known for his stammer, did not find amusing. To his host’s question about what a certain individual was like, Waugh replied characteristically, ‘a pansy with a stammer’. He recalled, «All the Picassos on the wall blanched, but Maugham remained calm», John Whitley, «A little place in the sun», Telegraph Magazine, August 17, 1996.
^ «Some femmes fatales play to a man’s sexuality, some to his intelligence, but she just played to my damn ego,» Ed Rollins, «Arianna», News Review, The Sunday Times, August 11, 1996.
^ «Ed Victor, doyen of literary agents and habitué of the Hamptons, a celebrity playground in Long Island, New York State», P.H.S., «The Times Diary», The Times, September 21, 1996.
^ «The French right-wing daily [Le Figaro] pleads for tolerance of American hauteur», «Press Watch», The European, August 8–14, 1996.
^ «This has provoked speculation that Yeltsin is too ill to be operated on. Perhaps the two German doctors offering their services can help resolve the impasse,» Carey Scott, «Inside Moscow», The Sunday Times, September 15, 1996.
^ «An investigation was started over allegations that the local jeunesse dorée had been involved in a drugs, drink and sex orgy in the cemetery,» Roger Faligot, «Grave issue that won’t die down», The European, August 8–14, 1996.
^ «Brunswick Street […] a small-scale version of Manhattan’s East Village, […] where there is always an intense would-be litterateur scribbling madly at a corner table in some smoky dive,» Douglas Kennedy, «Light relief in a tale of two cities», The Times Weekend, August 24, 1996.
^ «She liked to alternate her smart parties with much more louche affairs at which drugs circulated as frequently as the cocktails,» John Whitley, «A little place in the sun», Telegraph Magazine, August 17, 1996.
^ New Fowler’s Modern English Usage (3rd ed.). p. 475.
^ «I’ve always thought Anne Boleyn was a bit of a madame. She thought she could get away with anything,» «Interview of Keith Michell», The Observer Review, October 27, 1996.
^ «Harry Walston had little option but to let [Graham] Greene form part of their unusual ménage à trois: Catherine had made it plain to Harry that if he wanted to keep her, Greene must remain part of her life,» «P.H.S.», «The Times Diary», The Times, September 21, 1996.
^ «Bouncing out of the shower to investigate the commotion came a boxer whose nom de guerre says it all: the Grim Reaper,» Peter Hillmore, «Pendennis», The Observer Review, October 27, 1996.
^ «Fleur Cowles knows everybody who is anybody and mostly has the photographs to prove it. A saunter through her hallway produces more evidence of a networker par excellence,» Mary Riddell, «How to make friends», The Times, August 13, 1996.
^ «A Mirage of Modernity: pas de deux of Consumption and Production», title of Hong Kong researcher Yan Hairong’ contribution to Unquiet Migration (Hsiao-Chuan Hsia ed.), 2009.
^ «But just because a word has briefly become part of the nation’s playground patois, does that qualify it for a place in the OED?,» Jon Stock,»Mish to explain – a rap session wiv yoof», Weekend Telegraph, August 17, 1996.
^ «Prices of developments [at Rotherhithe] are rising as professionals working at Canary Wharf and elsewhere in Docklands seek a pied à terre», The Daily Telegraph, August 14, 1996.
^ «Pour encourager les autres — Everything2.com». everything2.com. Retrieved April 14, 2018.
^ «[Daniel] Harding is a protégé of Sir Simon Rattle, himself once heralded as the great young hope of British Music,» «Nigel Reynolds, Britain’s latest prodigy takes up toughest baton», The Daily Telegraph, September 12, 1996.
^ «Undoubtedly his modus operandi is not unlike the fluent pub raconteur who augments a story until he gets a laugh,» Bill Bryson, «A Yank at the court of Little England», The Sunday Times, August 11, 1996.
^ «Support for the Tibetan movement stopped in 1971 when President Nixon and Henry Kissinger pursued a policy of rapprochement with China.» Brent Navarro, Tibet: Assessing its Potential for China’s Instability Archived 2010-06-16 at the Wayback Machine, September 15, 2007.
^ «Refoulement | United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization». www.unesco.org. Retrieved July 13, 2017.
^ «A startling number of American restaurateurs have turned to caviar chic as a sure way of winning customers,» Tony Allen Mills, Style, September 15, 1996.
^ «This roman à clef sets out to recount the struggle between the media moguls Robert Maxwell […] and Rupert Murdoch,» «Review by Laurence Meyer of Jeffrey Archer’s The Fourth Estate«, International Herald Tribune, July 31, 1996.
^ «The pictures he took of [Julia] Roberts — sans new boyfriend — will run in the American tabloid The Star,» «Videonasties», The Sunday Times, Style, August 18, 1996.
^ «Nigel Lawson used to be known by the sobriquet of ‘Smuggins’,» Peter Hillmore, «Pendennis», The Observer Review, October 27, 1996.
^ «So they come up with a succes d’estime and a series of flops d’estime follow,» Christopher Fildes, «Take it easy Mr Bond, help is on the way – Miss Moneypenny will fix it», Business News, The Daily Telegraph, August 17, 1996.
^ «The focus of the salon was the magnificent chimney piece, a tour de force in moulded and faceted glass – and housing an up-to-date electric fire,» Kenneth Powell, «Mayfair’s hidden treasure», The Sunday Review, The Sunday Telegraph, August 18, 1996
^ «The film begins briskly, with […] a tour-de-force action scene in mid-air», Nigel Andrews, «Super hero into super-hulk», Financial Times, August 22, 1996.
^ «It [the proposed agreement] also involves the banks swapping at least £2 billion debt into two tranches of convertible securities which would, if converted, give them between 25% and 80% of the fully diluted equity,» Jonathan Ford, «Tunnel debt talks hit conversion snag», Evening Standard, Business Day, September 12, 1996.
^ «This constant va-et-vient of fortune hunters is what gives Lhasa the impermanent, feverish atmosphere of a typical cowboy town,» Ian Buruma, «Tibet Disenchanted», China File, July 20, 2000 (first published in the July 20, 2000 issue of the New York Review of Books).
^ «De Gaulle was always proud of displaying ‘la différence’ vis-à-vis the Americans in the Arab world,» Kirsty Lang, «They’re not all right, Jacques», The Sunday Times, October 27, 1996.
^ «a nation of voyeurs: people who get their gustatory kicks from watching other people cook but don’t actually do it themselves», Brenda Maddox, Cooking for kitchen voyeurs, The Times, September 11, 1996.
^ This usage is also illustrated by Savez-vous planter les choux [fr], a popular children’s song from the Middle Ages: Savez‐vous planter les choux […] À la mode de chez nous translates to «Do you know how to seed cabbage … Our way».
^ «Definition of NOSTALGIE DE LA BOUE». www.merriam-webster.com. Retrieved April 14, 2018.
^ «Throughout the year, the acquisition of a new vase or photograph, or the discovery of an object trouvé – a skeleton leaf, a fragment of painted paper, an intriguingly shaped piece of wood – is the excuse for a bout of rearranging,» Elspeth Thompson, «Still life with Agnès», The Sunday Telegraph Magazine, August 18, 1996.
^ voir dire The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition (2006)
^ voir The Anglo-Norman Dictionary

External links[edit]

Communications Instructions, Distress and Rescue Procedures (pdf), Combined Communications-Electronics Board
Online Etymology Dictionary Archived December 5, 2015, at the Wayback Machine, Harper, D.
«French words within complete sentences, text + audio files». parisbypod.com.
Mathematical Words: Origins and Sources (John Aldrich, University of Southampton) See Section on Contribution of French.

Источник

You’re probably aware that we regularly use plenty of French words in English.

But did you know that English is so close to the French language, that around 30% of English words come from the language of love?

Some of these French phrases in English (otherwise known as cognates!) are borrowed directly from the French language, while others have evolved from French origins.

We’ve put together some responses to some of the most common questions about the French presence in the English language for you, plus 99 examples of how English words didn’t fall too far from the French tree.

Everything you’ve ever wanted, right?

Why are there French words in the English language?

The origin of the English language is a topic linguists love to debate.

Although English is a Germanic language, it shares a lot of vocabulary with French – a Romance language.

But why?

The Norman Conquest of 1066 was a key event that led to French words being used in England.

Following the conquest, England was ruled by the Normans who spoke a northern form of Old French called Anglo-Norman French.

Under Norman rule, Anglo-Norman French began to influence the language of administration, law and culture in England, and hence making its mark on the English language.

Since then, French phrases and words – funny quirks and all – continued to make their way into the English language.

And French isn’t the only language that has made its mark on the English language. There are plenty of Spanish words in English, and a good handful of Japanese words in English, too.

How many French words are there in English?

There exists around 7,000 French words in the English language at present.

Believe it or not, though, there were plenty more English words that came from French (and typically Latin) roots originally – around 10,000, to be exact.

Do any examples come to mind? At this point, I’m sure you’re desperate to see some examples of English words with French origins…

Let’s start with 99 (we thought any more might be a bit much!).

Here are 99 common French words used in English, and their meaning

Allowance – from the Old French word alouance (payment)
Apostrophe – from the French word apostrophe
Attaché – from the French word attaché (attached)
Apéritif – from the French word apéritif
Avant-garde – from the French word avant-garde
Aviation – from the French word aviation
Bachelor – from the Anglo-Norman word bacheler (bachelier in modern French)
Baguette – from the French word baguette (stick)
Ballet – from the French word ballet
Beret – from the French word béret
Bon voyage – from the French phrase bon voyage (have a good journey)
Brunette – from the French word brunette
Bureau – from the French word bureau (desk, office)
Cabaret – from the French word cabaret
Cadet – from the French word cadet
Champagne – from the French word champagne
Chauffeur – from the French word chauffeur
Chic – from the French word chic (elegant)
Cliché – from the French word cliché
Connoisseur – from the French word connoisseur
Cul-de-sac – from the French word cul-de-sac (bottom of the bag/sack)
Debris – from the French word débris (broken, crumbled)
Déjà vu – from the French words déjà (already) and vu (seen – past participle of ‘voir’)
Delegate – from the Old French word delegat
Detour – from the French word détour (from détourner)
Dossier – from the French word dossier
Eau de toilette – from the French word eau de toilette
Elite – from the Old French word elit (chosen)
Energy – from the Middle French word énergie
En route – from the French en route
Envisage – from the French word envisager
Expatriate – from the French word expatrier
Facade – from the French word façade
Faux, as in faux fur – from the French word faux (false)
Faux-pas – from the French word faux pas
Fiancé – from the French word fiancé
Film noir – from the French word film noir (a film genre)
Gallery – from the Old French word galerie
Gastronomy – from the French word gastronomie
Gateau – from the French word gâteau
Gazette – from the French word gazette
Heritage – from the Old French word eritage (héritage in modern French)
Homage – from the Old French word homage
Hotel – from the French word hôtel
Identity – from the Middle French word identité
Illusion – from the Old French word illusion
Insult – from the Middle French words insult (noun) and insulter (verb)
Irony – from the Middle French word ironie
Jubilee – from the Middle French word jubile (modern French jubilé)
Kilogram – from the French word kilogramme
Lacrosse – from the Canadian French word la crosse (the stick)
Laissez-faire – from the French word laissez-faire (leave things to take their course)
Liaison – from the French word liaison
Literature – from the Old French word littérature
Machine – from the Middle French word machine
Magnificent – from the Middle French word magnificent
Maisonette – from the French word maisonette
Massage – from the French word massage
Menu – from the French word menu
Metabolism – from the French word métabolisme
Metro – from the French word métro
Musketeer – from the French word mousquetaire
Navy – from the Old French word navie
Neutral – from the Middle French word neutral
Nocturnal – from the Middle French word nocturnal
Novel – from the Old French word novel
Occasion – from the Middle French word occasion
Omelette – from the French word omelette
Optimism – from the French word optimisme
Papier-mâché – from the French word papier-mâché
Parasol – from the French word parasol
Poetic – from the Middle French word poétique
Premiere – from the French word première
Purify – from the Old French word purifier
Recipient – from the Middle French word récipient
Rendez-vous – from the French word rendez-vous (appointment)
Reservoir – from the French word ‘réservoir’ (collection place)
Restaurant – from the French word restaurant
Ricochet – from the French word ricochet
Rich – from the French word riche
Ridicule – from the French word ridicule
Risqué – from the French word risqué
Sabotage – from the French word sabotage
Salad – from the French word salade
Sentiment – from the Old French word sentement
Silhouette – from the French word silhouette
Solicitor – from the Middle French word soliciteur
Souvenir – from the French word souvenir (memory)
Soufflé – from the French word soufflé
Soup – from the French word soupe
Technique – from the French word technique
Television – from the French word télévision
Tournament – from the Old French word tornoiement (tournoiement in modern French)
Uniform – from the Middle French word uniforme
Utensil – from the Old French word utensile
Valid – from the Middle French word valide
Variety – from the Middle French word varieté
Vinaigrette – from the French word vinaigrette
Zest – from the French word zeste

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If you’re an English speaker and you ever thought French was difficult (or a French speaker and ever thought English was difficult!) hopefully, this is something to reassure you: no matter whether you’ve got your French pronunciation accent down or not, the learning process may be easier than you think!

You already have a good understanding of so many French words – why not learn even more today?

There’s so much more to French than these 99 words

We’re Busuu, the language-learning app – and we help people really learn French.

Level up with help from award-winning self-paced courses, support from our community of 120+ million native speakers and more.

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Источник

Even if you’re just starting to study French, believe it or not, you’ve already got a pretty extensive vocabulary!

The reason for this is over 10,000 English words come from French. Many others come from Latin, the language from which French originated.

This means that a significant number of English words have either exact French counterparts or very similar equivalents in French.

That’s something to celebrate! But, you might be wondering, just how did all of these French words get into English? How many French words are there in English? Let’s take a look at the French influence on the English language, and how it can help you with French vocabulary today!

When were French words borrowed into English?

In order to understand the way French influenced the English language, you have to know a little bit of history.

In antiquity, Celtic languages were spoken in the British Isles. Then, around 50 CE, most of the territory was invaded by the Romans. “Britannia” became a part of the Roman Empire, and Latin became the language of political and administrative life.

In the 5^th and 6^th centuries CE, Germanic tribes, including the Angles and the Saxons, invaded Britain, bringing their language with them.

But Latin remained a strong presence, since it was the language of the powerful and far-reaching Catholic Church (the Germanic tribes had quickly converted to Catholicism).

All religious services and texts were in Latin. This led to words commonly heard during masses and in religious parables becoming a part of everyday vocabulary.

Some of the Latin words that began to infiltrate the language of British people at this time include “devil” (Latin: diabolus) and “angel” (Latin: angelus).

Like its fellow Romance languages, French is a form of Vulgarized (that is, spoken by the people and influenced by previously existing local dialects) Latin. This is one of the reasons why there are so many similar words in French and Latin-influenced English. But it’s not the only reason why – not by far.

The main reason for the large number of French words in English can be chalked up to another invasion: the Norman Invasion of 1066, when William the Conqueror (Guillaume le Conquerant in French) staked his claim to the British throne and won it in the Battle of Hastings.

If you’re an art person, rather than a linguistics or history person, this battle may sound familiar – it’s immortalized on the Bayeux Tapestry.

After William’s accession to the throne, the royal court was made up of Norman (from Normandy) nobility, who spoke French.

Old English and French coexisted, often quite separately, since most people in Britain never had contact with nobility.

But over time, French words began to creep into English.

These were mainly in areas like law, administration, and, unsurprisingly, food. For example, this excellent (and very funny) video about the history of English points out that while words like “pig” and “sheep” have Germanic roots, their food forms– “pork” (porc) and “mutton” (mouton) – come from French.

A few other French words that entered the English language in this era include sovereign (souverain), justice (justice), and counsel (conseil).

As the centuries went by, English continued to evolve, and and became recognized in its own right. It was used in the daily life of the upper classes and clergy, as well as the commoners. Latin did make a comeback, though. During the Renaissance, cultured people spoke it, and later, in the Age of Enlightenment, Latin was used again when classifying scientific discoveries and phenomena.

Over the course of its tumultuous history, and English has borrowed from and been influenced by many different languages. But French and Latin have had the most influence. French and Latin words make up 58 % of modern English vocabulary today. On their own, purely French words make up 29% of English.

It’s generally thought that around 10,000 words have been borrowed into English from French. Of those, according to this source, there are over 1,700 “true cognates” – that is, words that not only look the same or similar, but have exactly the same meaning in both languages.

Why is the French (and Latin) influence on English important to French learners?

Sure, etymology is fascinating, and sure, what you’ve just read might make for some fun party conversation (well, depending on what kind of parties you go to…). But is all of this really important? After all, even if you can speak English, that doesn’t mean you can speak French.

But in fact, knowing this tie to French can help you. For one thing, you may have already experienced reading something in French and realizing that you understood more than you’d expected, because some of the words are the same in both languages. And on an even more helpful scale, since certain lexical features like suffixes can be the same in French and English, you may be able to guess how to say certain French words.

Six suffixes that are the same in French and English

Action and other words in -tion often have the same meaning in French and in English.

With that in mind, let’s look at six fairly common suffixes that are the same in both languages.

Before we do that, though, remember that a suffix is an ending that gives a particular meaning when it’s tacked onto a word. For example, -ly is a suffix in English that indicates a word is an adjective or adverb (examples: lovely, quietly).

Like English, French has many suffixes. A number of these come from Latin. These include:

-ation. Examples: nation/la nation ; information/l’information
-tion. Examples: acceleration/l’accélération ; attention/attention
-ssion. Examples: mission/une mission ; passion/la passion
-able. Examples : capable/capable ; table/la table ; adorable/adorable
-isme. Examples: Impressionism/l’impressionnisme ; racism/le racisme
-if/ive. Examples: furtive/furtif/furtive; creative/créatif/créative

As you can see, not all of these words are identical down to the letter. But knowing that root words in both languages can have these suffixes added to them can be helpful, especially in French conversation. Personally, this rule was one of the things that made speaking French a lot easier for me. If I knew a word in English that had one of these suffixes, there was a good chance that it was the same or similar in French.

Of course, this doesn’t mean that you’ll no longer have to memorize vocabulary for words with these endings. After all, there are some that don’t follow the rule. Take “vacation” – in French, it’s les vacances. Still, these common suffixes are good to keep in mind.

French circumflex words and English

French words with a circumflex like forêt often have a similar English counterpart.

Unlike English, the French language involves a lot of diacritical marks. While most accents in French words are used to indicate things like pronunciation, verb tense, or gender, one of them, the circumflex, is basically just a historical marker.

Most French words that have a circumflex once had an “s” after the accented letter. So, for example, the word château was once chasteau. The word forêt was once forest.

That “once” is a time when French words were being borrowed into English, and so, interestingly enough, many French circumflex words have English counterparts that are very similar, with an “s”. You may already know or have guessed the English equivalents of château and forêt, for example – castle and forest.

(Before we continue, yes, I know château is also “chateau” in English, but that word has a very specific connotation and isn’t used as a general term the way château is in French.)

As you can see with château/castle, not all French circumflex words have remained exactly the same in the two languages. And in some cases, like être , there’s no similar English word at all. So, while the tie between French circumflex words and English could be helpful to keep in mind in some cases (forêt/forest; hôtel/hotel; hôpital/hospital; théâtre/theatre, etc.), it isn’t a constant.

But for etymology fans like myself, it is a pretty neat tie to history, at the very least.

[optin-monster-shortcode id=”ifvvametyji10sky3qrx”]

False cognates – and why they exist in the first place

Some English and French words are written the same way or very similarly but have evolved to have very different meanings.

One of the most notorious of these faux amis is préservatif, which does not mean “preservative” in French, but…condom. Misusing this word is one of the most awkward French mistakes you can make!

So, the moral here is to still learn your vocabulary. But if you’re in a bind, you have a good chance of being able to find an equivalent French word if it contains one of those six suffixes I mentioned, or is related to a French circumflex word.

You may be wondering why faux amis exist at all, since English borrowed words directly from French and Latin. The answer is, it’s simply because of how language evolves. Even in English itself, certain words have changed meaning over time or have additional connotations than they previously did. A very interesting example of this – in both languages – is the word “gay”.

“Gay” was borrowed into English from the French gai (joyful, flashy). Over the 20^th century, it came to have an additional meaning in English: homosexual. Today, this is the dominant connotation that comes to mind for most English-speakers. The English “gay” has been borrowed back into French, where it also means “homosexual.” The French word gai(e) still means “happy” in French, although some francophones, including those in Quebec, also use this spelling instead of “gay”.

One of the most important things that etymology can teach us is that words are always evolving. While they’re being spoken and used by human beings, languages are living things. Faux amis aside, that’s pretty cool.

French words that are the same in English

Still, there are many words in English and French that are the same or very similar, both in spelling and meaning. Here’s a list of some of the most common. If you want to go further, at the end of this article, you’ll find a link to an extremely long and thorough alphabetical list.

French food and dining words that are the same in English

Many English food-related words originally came from French, but a majority of these have changed a bit over the centuries, to be pronounced and written in a more Anglophone way.

A good example of this are the words derived from the French word and verb dîner, which include dinner, diner, and dinette, as well as the verb “to dine”.

You’ll notice, first of all, that all of these words are pronounced differently than their French ancestors. You’ll also notice that their meanings have expanded from these two original borrowed words: “dinner” and “to dine” are the counterparts of le dîner and dîner, respectively, but a diner and dinette are types of restaurant.

Interestingly, “dinette” is also a French word, but it’ s a classic example of a faux ami. In French, une dinette in French is a child’s tea party set or set of plastic food toys. (It can also mean a light, late evening meal, although I’ve personally never heard it used that way, for what it’s worth.)

This being said, there are other French words related to food and dining whose meaning and spelling have remained more or less the same in French and English. A number of these were borrowed into English in recent centuries, when French cooking became a hallmark of class for Anglophones.

Here are some of the most common food- and dining -related words that are the same (or extremely similar) in French and English:

à la carte : when you want to order individual dishes which are not part of a pre-established sequence of courses.
menu
apéritif
café (a type of restaurant)
picnic
salade
soupe
omelette
bon appétit
hors d’œuvre
vinaigrette
restaurant
alcool (This word was originally borrowed into French from Arabic, by way of Latin)
chef (This means boss in French and not only “cook”.)

British English speakers also often use some common French food words, including:

cornichon
gateau
courgette
aubergine

French fashion and appearance words that are the same or similar in English

Every culture has its trends, fashions, and notions of beauty, but France has an international reputation for expertise in this area. It’s no wonder, then, that so many French words related to fashion and appearance have been borrowed into English. Here’s a list of some of the most common -including one that’s a very recent addition to the English language:

prêt-à-porter
chic
couture
silhouette
petite
faux (usually used to describe synthetic fur (faux fur), as opposed to fur from an animal)
sans fard – If you’re a fan of pop culture and celebrity gossip, you’ve probably come across this term in recent years. “Sans fard” (sometimes written “sans fards”) means “without makeup” and describes a photo where a person is wearing no makeup, and may not even be groomed in a glamorous way (for example, unbrushed hair, etc.). Of course, sans fard photos aren’t always truthful – many celebrities have been called out for abusing the term, since they are wearing at least very basic makeup and have their hair done in the shot.

French art and culture words that are the same or similar in English

Here are some French words that you’ll often hear or come across (or use) in English.

Art Nouveau
avant-garde
bas-relief
film noir
matinee (Note that in French, this word is most commonly used as a way to say “morning”.)
papier mâché (For many English speakers, this is written slightly differently: papier mache)
trompe l’oeil

In addition to artistic movements like Art Nouveau and Art Deco, which keep their French names in English, many artistic movements are written in a similar way in French and English. One of the main reasons for this is the suffix -ism/-isme. Here are a few examples:

Impressionism/impressionnisme
Realism/réalisme
Surrealism/surréalisme
Cubism/cubisme

You can find many other French words related to culture and the arts, including classical dance-related vocabulary on this excellent and extensive list.

Other common French words used in English

Some French words we use in English, like repertoire and protégé, don’t have exactly the same meaning in both languages – or at least, not the same primary meaning. For example, répertoire in French is most commonly used to describe a list of phone numbers; protégé means “protected” in French). But many other French words in English are used the same way in French, more or less. Here are some of them:

bourgeois
brunette
blond(e)
adieu
au contraire
chauffeur
chic
critique
depot
déjà vu
(eau de) cologne
eau de toilette
en route
entrepreneur
fiancé (Note that while in English, this can refer to a man or a woman, in French, a female person someone is engaged to is fiancée, the word’s feminine form.)
genre
laissez-faire
maître d’ (this is used in its complete form, maître d’hôtel, in French)
joie de vivre
toilette
nouveau riche
faux pas
je ne sais quoi
carte blanche
voyeur
R.S.V.P (Many English-speakers don’t realize this is an abbreviation of Répondez s’il vous plait)
souvenir
par excellence
potpourri
Bon voyage (learn more here)
cliché (Note that in French, in addition to its most well-known meaning, cliché is another way to say “photo”)
au pair
femme fatale
bouquet
boutique
coup
milieu
ménage à trois
bon vivant
bon mot
coup d’état
de rigueur
savoir-faire
tête à tête
Voila (I usually see the word written without an accent in English, but remember that it’s actually written like this in French: Voilà).
du jour

These are just the most common French words used in English, but there are many more, especially if you’re watching or reading something featuring educated, possibly pretentious characters – or spending time with them in real life. You can find a more extensive list of French words and expressions in English here.

The three kinds of French words in English – and where to find them all

The words on our lists are among the most noticeable French words in English, because they haven’t changed (or haven’t changed much) from their original spellings and meanings. But what about the thousands of other French words that are supposed to make up the English language?

Since most of these words have evolved over the centuries, they may still be very similar to their French ancestors, or quite a bit different. Take, for example, one of my favorite English words, “jaunty”, which evolved in both spelling and meaning from the French word gentil.

You can find an alphabetical list of French words in English, including these original borrowings that have evolved away from their French forms, here.

And of course, don’t forget the English words that have a counterpart in French thanks to Latin. You can see some of those on this list.

Do you have a favorite French word or expression that’s used in English? Are there any words these lists that surprised you? If so, why not try to use them today?

Источник

Almost every language nowadays has some words that are borrowed from other languages. It’s fascinating how many languages still use those words in their original forms.

You already know that there are many French words in English that we use on a regular basis.

But, do you know which words exactly?

Today, there are around 10,000 French words that are still used in modern English. You probably know some of them already, but we’re sure that there’s a lot you haven’t heard of.

That’s why we decided to share with you 101 words that are used in English.

But let’s start from the beginning by understanding how these two languages are connected and why their bond lasts to this date.

French-English connections

We are going to tell you a short story about French and English connection.

The connection between France and England dates back from 1066 when William the Conqueror (Guillaume le Conquerant) took over the British throne.

This is how French became the language of the Anglo-Norman court, the government, and the elite. It also started having a big influence on the administration, law, and culture.

French influence on the English language continued after the Hundred Year’s War.

Today, it is considered that there are around 45% of words in English that originate from the French language.

French words in English with the same meaning

As you can see, these events in history are the reason French words are used in English today.

There are, of course, other languages English has borrowed from, but French is the absolute winner with the coverage of about 58% of the English vocabulary.

In the following paragraphs, you’ll find words that have the same meaning in both French and English and are used in the same situations.

They are called cognates, or to be more specific,
French cognates.

Disclaimer: The first word is written in English and the second one in French. You will see how many of them are written in the same way.

Food-related words

There are plenty of food-related English words that come from French. Over the centuries, they’ve changed a bit, getting English characteristics.

You can find some of them below:

A la carte — A la carte
Apéritif – Apéritif
Aubergine — Aubergine
Baguette – Baguette
Café — Café
Cornichon — Cornichon
Champagne – Champagne
Gastronomy – Gastronomie
Gateau – Gâteau
Menu – Menu
Omelette – Omelette
Picnic- Picnic
Restaurant – Restaurant
Salad – Salade
Soufflé – Soufflé
Soup – Soupe
Vinaigrette – Vinaigrette

Fashion and appearance

It’s a known fact that France is the centre of fashion and style. Therefore, it’s not so strange that many words in English concerning fashion come from French.

Let’s take a look at some of them:

Beret – Béret
Boutique- Boutique
Brunette – Brunette
Chic – Chic meaning elegant
Couture- Couture
Eau de toilette – Eau de toilette
Faux- Faux; meaning false
Silhouette – Silhouette
Uniform – Uniforme

Art, culture, and language

We can’t finish this article without mentioning some borrowed words concerning art, culture, and language.

Here they are:

Apostrophe– Apostrophe
Attaché– Attaché; literally meaning attached
Avant-garde – Avant-garde, used mainly in arts
Ballet – Ballet
Film noir – Film noir, in the meaning ‘a film genre
Gallery – Galerie
Genre- Genre
Irony – Ironie
Gazette – Gazette
Papier-mâché – Papier-mâché
Poetic – Poétique, used in the Middle French

Other French words used in English

There are many more borrowed words that are used in everyday conversations.

Here are some of them:

Allowance – from the Old French word alouance, which means payment
Aviation – Aviation
Bachelor – Bachelier
Bon voyage – Bon voyage; translated to English, it means ‘have a good journey.’
Bouquet- Bouquet
Bureau – Bureau; it means ‘desk,’ or ‘office.’
Cabaret – Cabaret
Carte blanche — Carte blanche; it usually means ‘granting unlimited authority.’ Literally, it can be translated as ‘white card’, as in a blank check
Chauffeur – Chauffeur
Cliché –Cliché, which means a phrase that is overused
Connoisseur – Connoisseur
Crème de la crème- Crème de la crème; this expression comes from Latin ‘le nec plus ultra’. It can be translated as ‘cream of the cream’ and represents the best person or a thing of a particular kind.
Cul-de-sac – Cul-de-sac; in English, it means ‘the bottom of the bag/sack.’
Debris – Débris; the literal meaning in English is ‘broken, crumbled.’
Déjà vu –Déjà vu; from déjà (already) and vu (seen – past participle of ‘voir’)
Delegate – Delegat
Detour – Détour; from French verb détourner, which means ‘divert.’
Dossier – Dossie
Elite – Elit; it comes from the Old French, which means ‘chosen.’
Energy – Énergie
Entrepreneur — Entrepreneur
En route – En route
Et voilà ! — Et voilà ! It’s used to call attention when something is completed or done with success
Expatriate – from the French word expatrier
Facade – Façade
Faux pas — Faux pas; or in English ‘false step’
Fiancé – Fiancé
Heritage – Eritage, or Héritage in modern French
Homage – Homage
Hotel – Hôtel
Identity – Identité
Illusion – Illusion
Insult – Insult (noun), Iinsulter (verb)
Jubilee – Jubilé
Kilogram – Kilogramme
Lacrosse – La crosse; this word in Canadian French means ‘the stick.’
Laissez-faire – Laissez-faire; translated to English, it means ‘leave things to take their course.’
Liaison – Liaison
Machine – Machine
Magnificent – Magnificent
Maisonette – Maisonette
Massage – Massage
Metabolism – Métabolisme
Metro –Métro
Mirage- Mirage; a natural phenomenon caused by atmospheric optics and the Sun’s rays.
Musketeer – Mousquetaire
Navy – Navie
Neutral – Neutral
Nocturnal – Nocturnal
Novel – Novel
Occasion – Occasion
Optimism – Optimisme
Parasol – Parasol
Par excellence- Par excellence, which can be translated as ‘by excellence’, and it means the ultimate or quintessential
Premiere – Première
Purify – Purifier
Recipient – Récipient
Rendez-vous – Rendez-vous, which means appointment or a date
Reservoir – Réservoir, which can be translated as ‘collection place’
Ricochet – Ricochet
Rich – Riche
Ridicule – Ridicule
Risqué – Risqué
Sabotage – Sabotage
Sentiment – Sentement
Solicitor – Soliciteur
Souvenir – Souvenir; this word means ‘memory,’ but it’s widely used as a thing that reminds you of places, events, people, etc.
Technique – Technique
Television – Télévision
Tournament – Tournoiement
Utensil – Utensile
Valid – Valide
Variety – Varieté
Vis-à-vis- Vis-à-vis; it means ‘regarding’ or ‘concerning,’ but the equivalent in English can also be ‘face to face.’

French words in English with different meanings

These words are called
false cognates. It means that they are written the same way, but their meanings are different.

Here are some examples of false cognates in French and English.

Actor (not a comedian) — Comédien
Bookstore- Librairie; have in mind that this isn’t a library.
Currently- Actuelement; note that it isn’t actual(ly)
(to) Disappoint — Décevoir; not to deceive
Former- Ancient; in English, it isn’t ancient
Possible/ Possibly- Éventuelement
Publisher- Éditeur; be careful; it isn’t an editor in English.
Sensitive- Sensible; in English, it isn’t ‘sensible’ but ‘sensitive.’
(to) Summarize- Résumer; note that this word in English isn’t ‘to resume.’
(to) Take an exam- Passer un examen; pay attention when using this one.

Conclusion

These words are some common ones, but there are many, many more.

As you could see, over history, both languages influenced each other. Not only that, but a significant impact is also seen in their cultures as well.

French played the leading role in modern English, so it’s not so strange that English speakers find it
easy to learn French. So, if you already speak English, then use that to your advantage and
start learning French.

Are you now ready to learn French?

Book your lesson on Justlearn.

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There is no doubt that the French language has had a profound impact on English over the years. In fact, there are currently numerous French words that are used in English today. But why do so many French words find their way into our language? And where did they come from in the first place?

One of the main reasons why so many French words have found their way into English is because of the close relationship that has historically existed between their countries of origin. In fact, for centuries, France was one of England’s closest allies. As a result, the two countries have shared a lot of linguistic influence over the years.

But it’s not just because of historical ties that French words have found their way into English. Many of these words have also become popular because they sound sophisticated and chic. After all, there’s something undeniably alluring about the French language, and its associated words just seem to roll off the tongue.

So without further ado, let’s take a look at some of the most common French words used in English – you’ll definitely recognize at least a few of them.

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Etiquette

Etiquette is a French word that means «rules of conduct.» It derives from the French verb étiqueter, which means «to label» or «to classify.» In English, etiquette refers to how one should behave in specific social situations.

Etiquette is about what’s appropriate and inappropriate when it comes to manners and behavior. It tells us things like how to dress, how to speak, and how to act in upscale settings.

Sabotage

Sabotage is a French word that means «to damage» or «to destroy.» It comes from the French verb sabot, which referred to a kind of wooden boots worn by peasants. During industrialization times, disgruntled peasants protested factories by throwing their wooden boots into the machinery to destroy it.

In English, the word sabotage refers to any deliberate action that is taken in order to damage or destroy something. It can be used to describe physical acts of destruction, like vandalizing a building, or it can refer to more subtle forms of sabotage, like spreading rumors about someone.

Dentist

Dentist is one of the English words that have a French origin – and when translated literally, it simply means «toother.» It comes from the French verb dents, or «teeth.»

In English vocabulary, the word dentist means a medical professional who specializes in the diagnosis and treatment of teeth-related problems. In modern French, the similar word, dentiste, is used.

Déjà-Vu

Déjà-vu is a colloquial French phrase that means «already seen.» It comes from the French verb déjà, which means «already,» and the noun vu, which means «seen” – so the translation is pretty simple.

In French, however, you can hear this word in two variations: déjà vu, which expresses re-seeing something or someone; and déjà-vu (with a hyphen), which relates to the weird phenomenon of feeling like you’ve already experienced something.

Mirage

Mirage is a French word that means «illusion.» It comes from the Latin word mirari, which means «to look at» or «to wonder at.»

In English, a mirage is an optical illusion caused by atmospheric conditions. When you see a mirage, it looks like there’s water in the distance, but as you get closer the image of water disappears.

Façade

Façade is a French word that means «front» or «face.» It comes from the Latin word facies, which means «face.» Nevertheless, it’s not used in modern French with this meaning – the word for a person’s face is visage.

Just like the English, the French meaning of facade is the front or face of a building. It’s the part of the building that you see when you look at it from the street. The facade is often the most decorated part of a building.

Pot-pourri

Pot-pourri is a French word that means «a mixture.» It comes from the Old French word pourri, which referred to rotting or decaying matter. So, to translate literally, pot-pourri would mean a rotting pot.

Nevertheless, as in English, in French, potpourri refers to a mix of dried flowers and spices used to get rid of bad odors. It’s often placed in wardrobes and drawers – to keep things smelling fresh.

Cliché

Cliché is a French word that means «stereotype.» It comes from the French verb clicher, which means «to make a print» or «to reproduce.»

If you speak English, you probably know that a cliché is an overused phrase or idea that has become trite and unoriginal. Clichés are often used in writing and in everyday speech. They can be phrases, like «a dime a dozen,» or ideas, like «love conquers all.»

En route

En route is a French phrase that means «on the way.» It comes from the French preposition en, which means «in,» and the noun route, which means «road» or «route.»

In English, the phrase en route is used to describe something that’s happening while you’re going somewhere. For example, you might say, «I got a call from my boss en route to the meeting.»

Queue

Queue is a French word that means «tail.» It comes from the Old French word cue, which also meant «tail.»

In English, a queue is a line of people or vehicles waiting for something. For example, you might say, «There was a long queue at the grocery store this morning.» However, note that this word is only used in British English – in American English, you would use the word “line.”

Cul de sac

Cul de sac is a French phrase that means «dead end.» It comes from the French words cul, which means «bottom,» and de sac, which means «of a bag.»

English speakers use cul-de-sac to refer to a street with only one way in or out. It’s often used as a residential street because it’s considered a safe place for children to play.

Hors d’œuvre

Hors d’œuvre is a French phrase that means «out of the work.» It comes from the French words hors, which means «out of,» and œuvre, which means «work.»

When English speakers are talking about hors d’œuvres, they are talking about small dishes – often finger foods – that are served before the main course. Note that in English, you can make a plural out of this word: hors d’oeuvres, but in French, it exists only in the singular form.

R.S.V.P

R.S.V.P. is one of the French phrases that came to the English language as part of etiquette and stayed. It stands for «répondez, s’il vous plaît,» which means «respond, please.» It’s an abbreviation often used on invitations to let the host know whether or not you’re coming to the event.

In English, when you receive an invitation with R.S.V.P., it’s considered polite to respond – either «yes» or «no.» The host usually needs to know how many people will be attending so that they can prepare accordingly.

A la carte

A la carte is a French phrase that means «according to the menu.» It comes from the French words à, which means «to,» and la carte, which means «the menu.»

In English, when you order à la carte, you order each item on the menu separately. For example, a waiter might ask you «Would you like the a la cart or the prix-fixe menu?»

Souvenir

Souvenir is a French word that means «memory.» It comes from the Latin word subveniō, which means «to come to mind.»

In English, a souvenir is an object that you keep to remember a person, place, or event. For example, you might buy a snow globe as a souvenir from your trip to Paris. Nevertheless, when using this word in French, make sure to remember its original meaning.

Chic

Chic is a French word that means «stylish.» Its origin is not well-known, but it might come from the Old German word Schick, which means «skill» or «talent.»

The English word “chic” means someone or something that’s fashionable and stylish. For example, you might say, «She always looks so chic in her designer clothes.»

Ambulance

Ambulance is a word derived from French that can literally be translated as a “walking hospital.” It comes from the Latin word ambulō, which means «to walk.»

Today, both in French and in English, an ambulance is a vehicle used to transport people who are sick or injured to the hospital.

Restaurant

Restaurant is a French word that comes from the Latin word restaurāre, which means «to restore.» The literal meaning of the original Latin is «to restore with food.»

In modern English and French, a restaurant is a place where you can buy and eat food.

Faux-pas

A faux pas is a French term that means «a mistake.» It comes from the French words faux, which means «false,» and pas, which means «step.»

In English, it’s a social mistake. For example, you might say, «Making a rude comment at the dinner table was a major faux pas.»

Fiancé

Fiancé is a French word that means «betrothed.» It comes from the Old French word fiancer, which means «to betroth.» And, if you ask as, it is one of the most beautiful words both in French and in English.

In English and French, a fiancé is a man who is engaged to be married. The female equivalent is fiancée. As you can see, the English grammar in this word also has come under strong French influence, as in English, the word endings don’t change according to the word gender.

The French Language Is Full of Surprises

It’s interesting to see how many French words have also become English words. Out of the 20 words used in English that we’ve listed, 17 have the same meaning and origins. Additionally, all of these English words are used in both languages regularly. This just goes to show you how much influence French has had on the English language – and vice versa.

French has a long and rich history, and there are many more words and grammar similarities that you can see in English today. If you’re interested in learning more, be sure to check out our website or download the Langster app.

Boost your French vocabulary, start speaking French quickly, and make sure that your language learning journey is as interesting and exciting as possible.

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Used in English and French[edit]

A[edit]

B[edit]

C[edit]

D[edit]

E[edit]

F[edit]

G[edit]

H[edit]

I[edit]

J[edit]

L[edit]

M[edit]

N[edit]

O[edit]

P[edit]

Q[edit]

R[edit]

S[edit]

T[edit]

V[edit]

Z[edit]

Not used as such in French[edit]

Found only in English[edit]

French phrases in international air-sea rescue[edit]

See also[edit]

References[edit]

Further reading[edit]

External links[edit]

Why are there French words in the English language?

How many French words are there in English?

Here are 99 common French words used in English, and their meaning

There’s so much more to French than these 99 words

When were French words borrowed into English?

Why is the French (and Latin) influence on English important to French learners?

Six suffixes that are the same in French and English

French circumflex words and English

False cognates – and why they exist in the first place

French words that are the same in English

French food and dining words that are the same in English

French fashion and appearance words that are the same or similar in English

French art and culture words that are the same or similar in English

Other common French words used in English

The three kinds of French words in English – and where to find them all

French-English connections

French words in English with the same meaning

Food-related words

Fashion and appearance

Art, culture, and language

Other French words used in English

French words in English with different meanings

Conclusion

Etiquette

Sabotage

Dentist

Déjà-Vu

Mirage

Façade

Pot-pourri

Cliché

En route

Queue

Cul de sac

Hors d’œuvre

R.S.V.P

A la carte

Souvenir

Chic

Ambulance

Restaurant

Faux-pas

Fiancé

The French Language Is Full of Surprises