pouvier

Norman

Alternative forms

Etymology

From Old French povoir, pooir, from early Old French poeir, from Vulgar Latin potēre (“to be able”) for Classical Latin posse. *Potēre was a regularized form from the root potis (“able”) or formed on the basis of the present participle potens. The v is an epenthetic consonant added to avoid hiatus.

Verb

pouvier

  1. (Guernsey) can, to be able to
    • 1903, Edgar MacCulloch, “Proverbs, Weather Sayings, etc.”, in Guernsey Folk Lore‎[1], page 517:
      Va où tu peux, meurs où tu deis.
      Go where you can, die where you must.
This article is issued from Wiktionary. The text is available under Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 4.0 unless otherwise noted. Additional terms may apply for the media files.