Talk:galactophage

French uses

3 good cites moved to Citations.

• Original date needed, Voltaire, title of work, in Œuvres complètes de Voltaire, ed. Adrien Jean Quentin Beauchot, Georges Bengesco, 1877, Page 424

  Vous croyez donc, monsieur le galactophage, qu'il n'ya de gens sobres dans le monde que ceux qui vivent de Jait comme vous; et vous pensez que les autres ...

• As noted below, that letter is dated 19 November 1775. -- Visviva 04:17, 9 March 2008 (UTC)

Same as above*Oeuvres complètes de Voltaire - Page 115 by Voltaire - 1862 A M. LE MARQUIS DE THIBOUVILLE. 19 novembre. Vous croyez donc, monsieur le galactophage, qu'il n'ya de gens sobres ...

Same as above*Oeuvres complètes de Voltaire - Page 289 by Voltaire - 1822 Vous croyez donc, monsieur le galactophage, •qu'il n'ya de gens sobres dans le monde que ceux qui vivent de lait, comme vous, et vous pensez que les autres ...

Dictionary mention XXX*Nouveau dictionnaire d'histoire naturelle, appliquée aux arts, à l ... - Page 476 1817 ... les Hottentots soufflent avec force dans sa vulve ; aussitôt le lait coule abondamment. Suivant Hérodote, les Scythes, peuple galactophage, ...

This is a dictionary of natural history, not language. --Una Smith 00:38, 9 March 2008 (UTC)

Dictionary mention XXX*Le grand vocabulaire françois: contenant 10. L'explication de chaque mot ... - Page 487 by Guyot (Joseph Nicolas), Sébastien-Roch-Nicolas Chamfort - 1770 GALACTOPHAGE ...

This dictionary seems likely to give origins. --Una Smith 00:38, 9 March 2008 (UTC)

I'm afraid not. [1] Still the earliest one we have though. -- Visviva 04:01, 9 March 2008 (UTC)

Dictionary mention: Néologie, ou Vocabulaire de mots nouveaux, à renouveler, ou pris dans des ... - Page 290, by Louis-Sébastien Mercier - 1801 GALACTOPHAGE. Qui ne vit que de lait. ...

Dictionary mention: Dictionnaire étymologiques des mots françois dérivés du grec et usités ... - Page 294 by J. B. Morin - 1803 - 528 pages Voyez GALACTOPHAGE. ...

Dictionary mention: Dictionnaire étymologique de la langue françoise, où les mots sont classés ... - Page 355 by Jean-Baptiste-Bonaventure de Roquefort - 1829 GALACTOPHAGE , qui ne se nourrit que de lait. ...

Dictionary mention: Dictionnaire étymologiques des mots françois dérivés du grec - Page 28 by J. B. Morin - French language - 1809 Voyez GALACTOPHAGE. LACTIQUE, adj. ...

"Galactophage" almost certainly not coined by Voltaire. --Una Smith 01:02, 9 March 2008 (UTC)

That doesn't follow from any of those, since Voltaire died in 1778 and had been writing actively since 1718. The fact that we don't have a use by him earlier than 1775 is somewhat problematic for my theory, though. :-) -- Visviva 04:01, 9 March 2008 (UTC)

I got the centuries mixed up. Nevermind. --Una Smith 15:01, 9 March 2008 (UTC)

Cahiers de lexicologie - Page 126 by Université de Besançon Centre d'étude du vocabulaire français - French language - 2007 Lire l'article galactophage, par exemple, dans 20 dictionnaires différents, consiste alors à prendre 20 fiches clairement identifiables par les index prévus ...

Le XVIIIe siécle - Page 1160 by Ferdinand Brunot, Alexis.. Frano̧is - French language - 1930 ... galactophage, ...

Maybe helpful? --Una Smith 04:08, 8 March 2008 (UTC)

Looks good (though I can't really read French). I am curious if it is original with Voltaire, or perhaps drawn from an earlier French translation of Herodotus or Strabo? -- Visviva 04:32, 8 March 2008 (UTC)

Some of the above are not independent (e.g., 3 editions of Voltaire). 2 look like dictionary mentions. 4 seem good. DCDuring TALK 05:05, 8 March 2008 (UTC)

Yes, the Voltaire editions are not independent, but any one may give the source. --Una Smith 00:38, 9 March 2008 (UTC)

Maybe helpful? --Una Smith 04:08, 8 March 2008 (UTC)

Looks good (though I can't really read French). I am curious if it is original with Voltaire, or perhaps drawn from an earlier French translation of Herodotus or Strabo? -- Visviva 04:32, 8 March 2008 (UTC)

Note the 1770 cite; maybe Voltaire got it from a book. --Una Smith 04:59, 8 March 2008 (UTC)

Well, Voltaire was already in his 70s by then.  :-) According to the old Encyclopaedia Britannica [2], the first translation of Herodotus was not published in French until 1786, so I guess that's out. The first French translation of Strabo was apparently du Theil's in 1805, so I guess that's out also... may indeed be a Voltaire-ism (albeit just cobbled from the Greek in any case). -- Visviva 05:07, 8 March 2008 (UTC)

That 1770 date opens the question: did Voltaire coin it then it got picked up in the book, or did Voltaire get it from this or some other book? --Una Smith 05:52, 8 March 2008 (UTC)

The "monsieur le galactophage" quote from Voltaire is from a letter dated 19 November 1775, so the 1770 citation is indeed the earliest we have (so far). -- Visviva 06:28, 8 March 2008 (UTC)

Update: Appeared in the Encyclopédie in volume 7, published 1757, see page on FR Wikisource. That entry contains the to-me-mysterious instruction: "Voyez le dictionn. de Trév." Looks like definitely an Enlightenment coinage. And may I just say that the work done by the French Wikipedians and Wikisourceans on the Encyclopédie is nothing short of astonishing. -- Visviva 04:11, 9 March 2008 (UTC)

OK, it's the fr:Dictionnaire de Trévoux, but I'm drawing a blank on any online editions of that work, or on any way of determining which of the various editions may have been intended by Diderot and his crew. -- Visviva 04:17, 9 March 2008 (UTC)

English cites

These are harder. I have personally heard galactophage used to mean child, esp. nursing child. How about checking DARE, anyone? --Una Smith 04:59, 8 March 2008 (UTC)

Here is another Usenet use, as an insult, so meaning is unknown. Most of the Usenet uses are copies of a single meme diatribe, and variants on it, containing the string "training bra". Excluding them, I have exhausted occurrences of "galactophage" in English in Google's Usenet archive. --Una Smith 15:15, 9 March 2008 (UTC)

The English cites should go under a separate header on the Citations page, to preserve them in case of English entry deletion and because Usenet doesn't usually make for good usage examples. DCDuring TALK 17:01, 9 March 2008 (UTC)