Etymology of "Entrepreneur"

From Wikipedia, the free, on-line encyclopedia, we have this:

The word "entrepreneur" is a loanword from French. In French the verb "entreprendre" means "to undertake", with "entre" coming from the Latin word meaning "between", and "prendre" meaning "to take". In French a person who performs a verb, has the ending of the verb changed to "eur", comparable to the "er" ending in English. "Unternehmer" (lit. "undertaker" in the literal sense of the word) is the high German equivalent and curiously, "Unternehmungs Forschung" is the German equivalent of Operations Research although the Anglo-Saxon model of the firm is fairly antithetical to the notion of management as a science.

Enterprise is similar to and has roots in, the French word "entreprise", which is the past participle of "entreprendre". Entrepreneuse is simply the French feminine counterpart of "entrepreneur".

Leave it to the French to have a feminine suffix. :-)

Anyway, Read the entire entry and follow its links.

Are you interested in words? I am. So, if you have something substantive to add, post a comment.

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