colère (French)
Where does "colère" come from?
The French 'colère' came into Old French as a borrowing of Late Latin 'cholera', which was itself taken from Ancient Greek 'χολέρα' (kholéra)[1]. The Greek term was a medical expression, and it is usually traced to 'χολή' (kholḗ), meaning 'gall, bile'[3][4]. That root goes back to Proto-Hellenic '*kʰolā́' and, further still, to a Proto-Indo-European form linked to 'green, yellow'[4]. Latin adopted the Greek word as 'cholera'[2], and French later kept a separate doublet, 'choléra', for the disease. 'Colère' retained the senses 'anger, rage' and 'wrath', so the word moved from a term for bodily fluid to one for emotion.
Open questions
- The Greek word 'χολέρα' has no fully settled derivation, since it may be a substantivized form of an unattested '*kholerós' with a shifted accent, and a Pre-Greek origin cannot be ruled out. [3]
- The Proto-Indo-European source of 'χολή' is a reconstructed form, so its details rest on comparative reconstruction rather than attested evidence. [4]
Full etymology tree
- colère (French), 'anger, rage'
- borrowed cholera (Latin), 'cholera'
- borrowed χολέρα (kholéra) (Ancient Greek), 'cholera, a disease in which the humors of the body are violently discharged by vomiting and stool'
- borrowed cholera (Latin), 'cholera'
Ancestors
- cholera (Latin)
- χολέρα (Ancient Greek)
Cognates and doublets
- choléra (French)
Descendants and derived words
- colère noire (French)
- en colère (French)
- piquer une colère (French)
- vert de colère (French)
Sources
- colère (French) - Wiktionary
- cholera (Latin) - Wiktionary
- χολέρα (kholéra) (Ancient Greek) - Wiktionary
- χολή (Ancient Greek) - Wiktionary
Updated October 2026
Etymology data from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0 · About Miraris