calque

From French calque (“calque”, literally “copy, tracing”), from calquer (“to copy, trace”) (whence also calk), itself borrowed from Italian calcare, from Latin calcāre (“to tread”). Doublet of calcate and calcation.

• IPA^(key): /kælk/

• Audio (US):

  (file)

• Rhymes: -ælk
• Homophones: calc, calk
• Hyphenation: calque

calque (plural calques)

1. (linguistics, translation studies) A word or phrase in a language formed by word-for-word or morpheme-by-morpheme translation of a word in another language.

   Synonyms: loan translation, calquing

   Hypernym: loan formation

   Coordinate term: (a term that is partially a calque and partially formally contains a foreign element) partial calque, loanblend

   • 2005 March 27, William Safire, “Kifaya!”, in The New York Times Magazine‎^[1]:

     David S. Powers, professor of Islamic history and law at Cornell, says he thinks that the word as used today is in the nature of what linguists call a calque, a borrowing from another language in literal translation […]

   • 2023 July 26, Patricia Mazzei, “‘Get Down’ From the Car. ‘Make’ the Line. Is Miami English a Dialect?”, in The New York Times‎^[2]:

     Those phrases, translated from Spanish, are known as calques.

• partial calque

• Hobson-Jobson
• loanword

• While the term calque is a loanword from French, the term loanword is a calque from the German compound noun Lehnwort.

• metaphrase

calque (third-person singular simple present calques, present participle calquing, simple past and past participle calqued)

1. (linguistics, translation studies, transitive) To adopt (a word or phrase) from one language to another by semantic translation of its parts.
   • 2024 June 7, Soumaya Amine Al Salti, “Calque Examples in Translating: Impacts on Linguistic Diversity”, in Soumaya Salti‎^[3]:

     Terms like "cloud computing" have been calqued into multiple languages, making it easier for global audiences to grasp complex technological concepts. […] For example, translating Shakespeare's works into other languages often involves calquing phrases to maintain the rhythm and metaphorical richness of the original.

• Douglas Harper (2001–2025) “calque”, in Online Etymology Dictionary.
• “calque”, in OneLook Dictionary Search.
• William Dwight Whitney, Benjamin E[li] Smith, editors (1911), “calque”, in The Century Dictionary […], New York, N.Y.: The Century Co., →OCLC.

• claque

calque

1. first/third-person singular present subjunctive of calcar

Deverbal from calquer, borrowed from Italian calcare, from Latin calcāre (“to tread”).

• IPA^(key): /kalk/

• Audio:

  (file)

calque m (plural calques)

1. tracing (the reproduction of an image made by copying it through translucent paper)
2. (lexicography) calque, loan translation
3. (computer graphics) layer

• → Belarusian: ка́лька (kálʹka)
• → Bulgarian: ка́лка (kálka)
• → Catalan: calc (semantic loan)
• → Czech: kalk
• → English: calque
• → Georgian: კალკი (ḳalḳi)
• → Italian: calco (semantic loan)
• → Latvian: kalks
• → Macedonian: калка (kalka)
• → Polish: kalka
• → Romanian: calc
• → Russian: ка́лька (kálʹka)
• → Serbo-Croatian: ка̏лк (kȁlk)
• → Slovak: kalk
• → Slovene: kalk
• → Spanish: calco (semantic loan)
• → Ukrainian: ка́лька (kálʹka)
• → Yiddish: קאַלקע (kalke)

• “calque”, in Trésor de la langue française informatisé [Digitized Treasury of the French Language], 2012.

• claque, claqué

calque

1. inflection of calcar:
   1. first/third-person singular present subjunctive
   2. third-person singular imperative

• Hyphenation: cal‧que
• Rhymes: -alkɨ, -awki

calque

1. inflection of calcar:
   1. first/third-person singular present subjunctive
   2. third-person singular imperative

Deverbal from calcar.

• calco

calque m (plural calques)

1. (linguistics) calque

   Synonym: decalque

• IPA^(key): /ˈkalke/ [ˈkal.ke]
• Rhymes: -alke
• Syllabification: cal‧que

calque

1. inflection of calcar:
   1. first/third-person singular present subjunctive
   2. third-person singular imperative