philtre

philtre (plural philtres)

1. Alternative spelling of philter (“kind of potion”).
   • 1908, Theodore Chickering Williams, transl., “On His Lady's Avarice”, in The Elegies of Tibullus‎^[1], translation of original by Tibullus:

     […] Bring hippomanes, / Fierce philtre from the frantic, brooding mare!

   • 1909, Charles Baudelaire, “The Irreparable”, in John Collings Squire, transl., Poems and Baudelaire Flowers:

     What wine, what drug, what philtre known of man / Will drown this ancient foe, / Ruthless and ravenous as a courtesan, / Sure as an ant, and slow?

   • 1936, Rollo Ahmed, The Black Art, London: Long, page 65:

     Old witches in the cities and country-side throve upon the sale of death spells and love philtres. They also made a trade of abortificants, and frequently practised the whiles of the procuress.

   • 1961, Harry E. Wedeck, Dictionary of Aphrodisiacs, New York: The Citadel Press, page 14:

     In the desperate search for amatory satisfactions, the most monstrous ingredients have throughout the ages, been sought and compounded into electuaries and pastilles, philtres and ointments.

philtre (third-person singular simple present philtres, present participle philtring, simple past and past participle philtred)

1. Alternative spelling of philter.
   • 1905, Justin Huntly McCarthy, The Dryad,:

     The friendship of the men he took amiably and modestly, though no man was his superior of all the king's men in strength or skill. The friendship of the women he let go by him, also very modestly but always with decision. There were many that longed to knock at the door of his heart and enter in, and there were some that showed their longing, most notably of all the beautiful Esclaramonde of Bayonne, whom most men worshipped for her dark, imperious loveliness, and whom all the women, her rivals, hated for a witch, and upbraided beneath their breaths for her skill in philtres.

• philter

Borrowed from Latin philtrum, itself a borrowing from Ancient Greek φίλτρον (phíltron). Unrelated to filtre.

• IPA^(key): /filtʁ/
• Homophone: filtre

philtre m (plural philtres)

1. philter (a kind of potion, charm, or drug intended to make the drinker fall in love with the giver)
   • 1857, Charles Baudelaire, “L'Irréparable”, in John Collings Squire, transl., Les Fleurs du mal:

     Dans quel philtre, dans quel vin, dans quelle tisane, / Noierons-nous ce vieil ennemi, / Destructeur et gourmand comme la courtisane, / Patient comme la fourmi?

     What wine, what drug, what philtre known of man / Will drown this ancient foe, / Ruthless and ravenous as a courtesan, / Sure as an ant, and slow?

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