# Etymology of French aujourd'hui?



## Arianllyn

Hiya,

I was wondering if anyone knew anything about the origins of the word "aujourd'hui"? It seems like "au jour", which would make sense, but I'm puzzled as to the "-d" and "hui" bits.

~A


----------



## timpeac

"hui" was the old French word for today on its own. I suppose it wasn't felt to be a "strong" enough word so the rest was added, something like "on the day of today".


----------



## zaby

So when we say "au jour d'aujourd'hui", a fashionable phrase, it's a double pleonasm  

There is more information about the etymology of aujourd'hui on atilf website


----------



## Jean-Michel Carrère

Indeed,* hui* has the same etymology as hoy(dia) in Spanish and oggi in Italian and comes from *hodie* in latin.


----------



## quadrax200

I would imagine that the "aujourd'" developed as a way to avoid confusion with the word "oui" as it would be pronounced the same as "hui"


----------



## timpeac

quadrax200 said:


> I would imagine that the "aujourd'" developed as a way to avoid confusion with the word "oui" as it would be pronounced the same as "hui"


Hi quadrax and welcome!

I don't know if that's true because the vowels represented by "ou" and "u" are pronounced quite differently in French.


----------



## quadrax200

timpeac said:


> Hi quadrax and welcome!
> 
> I don't know if that's true because the vowels represented by "ou" and "u" are pronounced quite differently in French.



Hmm, that is certainly true. They are very similar though. I was just venturing a guess.


----------



## NemoNobody

As far as I know, "aujourd'hui" comes from a contraction of medieval expression "au jour d'icelui", where "icelui" would be "celui-ci" ("this one") nowadays.

Hence "au jour d'icelui" was meaning something like "present day".


----------



## berndf

timpeac said:


> I don't know if that's true because the vowels represented by "ou" and "u" are pronounced quite differently in French.


But in this case they represent semi-vowels, [w] and [ɥ], respectively which are much closer than their vocalic counterparts  and [y].


----------



## berndf

NemoNobody said:


> As far as I know, "aujourd'hui" comes from a contraction of medieval expression "au jour d'icelui", where "icelui" would be "celui-ci" ("this one") nowadays.


If this were true you would have an unetymological "h" here. I am not aware of any examples of such an unetymological "h" in French, are you?


----------



## ManPaisa

Jean-Michel Carrère said:


> Indeed,* hui* has the same etymology as hoy(dia) in Spanish and oggi in Italian and comes from *hodie* in latin.



For emphasis, Spanish speakers often say _el día de hoy_, which mirrors the French construction_ aujourd´hui._


----------



## CapnPrep

berndf said:


> If this were true you would have an unetymological "h" here. I am not aware of any examples of such an unetymological "h" in French, are you?


_Huile_ < oleum, _huître < _ostrea, _huit  _< octo, _huis_ < ostium.

But yes, the <h> in _aujourd'hui_ is etymological (from _hodie_, as Jean-Michel Carrère explained — in 2006).


----------



## berndf

CapnPrep said:


> _Huile_ < oleum, _huître < _ostrea, _huit _< octo, _huis_ < ostium.


Stupid me. (Memo to myself: first switch on brain; then post!)


----------



## timpeac

CapnPrep said:


> But yes, the <h> in _aujourd'hui_ is etymological (from _hodie_, as Jean-Michel Carrère explained — in 2006).


Indeed - I believe that I remember through the haze of years from my time at university that hodie>hui is actually a perfectly regular phonetic development of a word from Latin to French, despite their very different forms.


----------



## ryba

Jean-Michel Carrère said:


> Indeed,* hui* has the same etymology as hoy(dia) in Spanish and oggi in Italian and comes from *hodie* in latin.



Just like *hui* /uj/ in Valencian Catalan and *uèi* /ɥɛj/ in Occitan.

Curiously, Catalan from Catalonia and the Balearic Islands uses a more modern word *avui* /ə'ßuj/, /ə'vuj/, /a'ßuj/ and you can come across the word *avuèi* /a'ßɥɛj/ in Languedocian Occitan. 

I wonder if their etymology is similar to that of _aujourd'hui_.


----------



## Outsider

ManPaisa said:


> For emphasis, Spanish speakers often say _el día de hoy_, which mirrors the French construction_ aujourd´hui._


_El día de hoy_ just means "on this day". English is a confusing medium to discuss these matters, because the word "today" includes the recognizable root "day" in itself.  This is not the case in Spanish: _día_ and _hoy_ are distinct. But now I'm wondering if _hodie_ was related to _dies_ in Latin...

The French phrase, as has been explained, originates in _au jour d'hui_, "on the day of today".


----------



## CapnPrep

ryba said:


> Curiously, Catalan from Catalonia and the Balearic Islands uses a more modern word *avui* /ə'ßuj/, /ə'vuj/, /a'ßuj/ and you can come across the word *avuèi* /a'ßɥɛj/ in Languedocian Occitan.


_Avui_ is _hui_ (< hodie), with fortition _vui_ (cf. _vuit_), preceded by the preposition _a_ (< ad).



Outsider said:


> But now I'm wondering if _hodie_ was related to _dies_ in Latin...


Sure, it's a reduction of _hoc die_.


----------



## NemoNobody

Outsider said:


> But now I'm wondering if _hodie_ was related to _dies_ in Latin....


 
"Hodie" is contraction of "hoc die" which is ablative declension of "hic dies" meaning "this day" (checked yesterday with a retired latin teacher).


----------



## Outsider

Thank you both. So, English is actually on the same line as Latin on this matter!

Time can erode contractions so that their etymology gets forgotten by most speakers, at which point they are reanalysed as independent words. This is basically what happened from _hoc die_ to _hoy_ and _hui_, and then later to _aujourd'hui_, and (perhaps) then again to _au jour d'aujourd'hui_. I wonder how far the iteration will go. 

Fun topic!


----------



## koniecswiata

Spanish does mirror this construction with "hoy dìa" which is often said instead of just "hoy".  
Interesting that French has the _au_ (from the preposition _a_?) at the beginning of the word preceding "jour" this does go in the line of English "today" (starting with the preposition "to"), Dutch vandaag (starting with the preposition "van", or Swedish i dag (starting with the prepostion "i").  It seems common that to form the word "today" the formula is "Preposition + day" (more or less).


----------



## euquila

"Today" is the only English word I can think of that contracts "to". Are there any others?


----------



## Forero

_Today_, _tonight_, _tomorrow_.


----------



## berndf

*Moderator note: This thread is about French, not English. Please don't let yourselves be carried away.*


----------



## Florin Bigan

In romanian language there is an expression "ziua de azi" which means "the day of today". In french "aujourd'hui" is the same, I think.


----------



## Sardokan1.0

Comparison with other Romance languages :

aujourd'hui -> au jour d'hui
_
*Italian :* al giorno d'oggi _(nowadays; literally "at day of today")
_*Sardinian :* in die de hoe_ (nowadays : literally "in day of today")

The "Hui" at the end simply means "Today"; from Latin "Hodie", shortened version of "Hoc Die" (this day).
_
*Spanish :* Hoy
*Sardinian :* Hoe, Hoi, Hoje
*Corsican :* Oghje
*Italian :* Oggi_


----------



## Olaszinhok

*Catalan:*
Avui
Avui dia - Avui en dia 

If I'm not mistaken, the latter expressions like the Italian _oggigiorno/ al giorno d'oggi_ and the Spanish _hoy en dìa_ rather mean these days/ nowadays


----------



## danielstan

koniecswiata said:


> Interesting that French has the _au_ (from the preposition _a_?) at the beginning of the word preceding "jour" ...


French _au _comes from _à le_.
Larousse ( Définitions : aujourd'hui - Dictionnaire de français Larousse) 
gives this etymology: 
aujourd'hui - (de _à le jour d'hui,_ de l'ancien français _hui,_ le jour où on est, du latin _hodie_)


----------



## fdb

Sardokan1.0 said:


> from Latin "Hodie", shortened version of "Hoc Die" (this day).



The derivation of Latin _hodie_ from _hoc die_ is problematic (one would not expect the -c- to be lost in Latin). It has been suggested that _ho-_ is the bare stem of the demonstrative pronoun, or that is from the ablative singular *_hod_ or the locative singular *_hoi_.


----------



## Kevin Beach

fdb said:


> The derivation of Latin _hodie_ from _hoc die_ is problematic (one would not expect the -c- to be lost in Latin). It has been suggested that _ho-_ is the bare stem of the demonstrative pronoun, or that is from the ablative singular *_hod_ or the locative singular *_hoi_.


In the ablative, wouldn't it be "ho die" anyway? "On this day" = "today".


----------

