devoir

Etymology

From Middle English devoir, from French devoir, from Old French deveir, from Latin dēbēre (“to owe; ought, must”).

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /dəˈvwɑː/
• Hyphenation: de‧voir

Noun

devoir (plural devoirs)

1. (archaic, often in plural) Duty, business; something that one must do.
   • 1603, John Florio, transl.; Michel de Montaigne, The Essayes, […], book I, printed at London: […] Edward Blount […], OCLC 946730821, page 149:

     […] he imprint not so much in his schollers mind […] where Marcellus died, as because he was unworthy of his devoire he died there […].

   • 1787, “A female” [pseudonym; Winifred Marshall Gales], The History of Lady Emma Melcombe, and Her Family. By a Female. In Three Volumes, volume III, London: Printed for G. G. J. and J. Robinson, OCLC 316739067, page 155:

     I should have long ere this paid my devoirs to the inhabitants of Raymond Castle.

   • 1836 July, “London Fashionable Chit-Chat”, in The Lady's Magazine and Museum of the Belles-lettres, Fine Arts, Music, Drama, Fashions, &c. (Improved Series. Enlarged.), volume IX, London: Dobbs & Co., Hemlock Court, Carey Street, Lincolns Inn (Formerly at 112, Fetter Lane), OCLC 5140771156, page 73:

     [M]y eyes were oft times [on the] charmante maitresse de la maison, who glided among her guests in her flowing Spanish mantilla, and train of the clearest blonde, doing her devoirs with winning kindness, and showing how much benevolence of manner adds to beauty.

   • 1873 March, H[enry] James Jr., “The Madonna of the Future”, in The Atlantic Monthly: A Magazine of Literature, Science, Art, and Politics, volume XXXI, number CLXXXV, Boston, Mass.: James R. Osgood and Company, late Ticknor & Fields, and Fields, Osgood & Co., page 277:

     A young man who arrives at Florence late in the evening, and, instead of going prosaically to bed, or hanging over the travellers' book at his hotel, walks forth without loss of time to pay his devoirs to the Beautiful, is a young man after my own heart!

   • 1885, Richard F[rancis] Burton, A Plain and Literal Translation of the Arabian Nights' Entertainments, now Entituled The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night: With Introduction, Explanatory Notes on the Manners and Customs of Moslem Men, and a Terminal Essay upon the History of The Nights, Benares [false, actually Stoke Newington, London]: Kamashastra Society, OCLC 556574150:

     Then quoth the portress to the mistress of the house, "O my lady, arise and go to thy place that I in turn may do my devoir."

   • 1983, Lawrence Durrell, Sebastian, or Ruling Passions (The Avignon Quintet; 4), London; Boston, Mass.: Faber & Faber, ISBN 978-0-571-13111-2; republished in The Avignon Quintet, London: Faber & Faber, 2004, ISBN 978-0-571-22555-2, page 1057:

     That is the little bit of essential information which enables us to complete our devoir – without it we are just ordinary people, dispossessed, taken unawares: the original sin!

Anagrams

• voider

Etymology

From Old French deveir, from Latin dēbēre, present active infinitive of dēbeō (“to owe; ought, must”).

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /də.vwaʁ/

• audio

  (file)

• Rhymes: -waʁ

Noun

devoir m (plural devoirs)

1. duty
2. exercise (set for homework)

Verb

devoir

1. must, to have to (as a requirement)
2. must, to do or have with certainty
3. (transitive) to owe (money, obligation and etc)
4. (literary, intransitive, in imperfect subjunctive, with inversion of subject) (even) though it be necessary (+ infinitive)
   • 1842, George Sand, Consuelo:

     Eh bien, se dit-elle, j'irai, dussé-je affronter les dangers réels [...]. ⇒ Well, she said to herself, I'll go, even if I have to face real danger.

5. (reflexive, ~ de) to have a duty to

See also

• falloir

Further reading

• “devoir” in le Trésor de la langue française informatisé (The Digitized Treasury of the French Language).

Etymology

Borrowed from French devoir, from Old French deveir, from Latin dēbēre (“to owe, to be duty bound to do something”).

Noun

devoir (plural devoirs)

1. devoir
   • 1479, William Caxton, De Consolatione Philosophiæ, translated into English by Geoffrey Chaucer:

     I William Caxton have done my devoir to enprint it

Alternative forms

• deveir
• deoir verb

Etymology

From Latin dēbēre, present active infinitive of dēbeō (“I owe, I am duty bound to do something”).

Verb

devoir

1. (modal) to have to; must
2. to owe

Noun

devoir m (oblique plural devoirs, nominative singular devoirs, nominative plural devoir)

1. debt

References

• Godefroy, Frédéric, Dictionnaire de l'ancienne langue française et de tous ses dialectes du IX^e au XV^e siècle (1881) (devoir)
• “Appendix E: Irregular Verbs” in E. Einhorn (1974), Old French: A Concise Handbook, Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, →ISBN, pages 152–153