Bourse (pronounced boors)
(1) A stock exchange, the term used variously (depending
on context): (1) as a synecdoche for “stock exchange”, (2) collectively of the
stock exchanges of continental Europe and (3) specifically the Paris stock
exchange (the Bourse de Paris, known usually
in English as the “Paris Bourse”).
(2) Figuratively, any place, real, virtual or imaginary
where (1) something of value is traded or (2) the value of something tradable
is set or settled.
(3) In philately, a meeting of stamp collectors and or
dealers where stamps and covers are sold or exchanged.
(4) In botany, the swollen basal part of an inflorescence
axis at the onset of fruit development; it bears leaves whose axillary buds
differentiate and may grow out as shoots.
1590s: From the mid sixteenth century French burse (meeting place of merchants), from
the French bourse (meeting place of
merchants (literally “purse”)), from the twelfth century Old French borse (money bag, purse), from the Medieval
Latin bursa (a bag), from the Late Latin
bursa (oxhide, animal skin and a
variant of variant of byrsa (hide)), from
the Ancient Greek βύρσα (búrsa or býrsa), (hide, wine-skin) of unknown
origin. Linked terms are used for other
European stock exchanges including the Danish børs, the Swedish börs
and the German Börse with the roots evident
in Modern English words including bursar and reimburse. Bursa
in Late Latin meant “oxhide, animal skin” (reflecting the origins in the Greek)
but, by association with use, in Medieval Latin came to mean “purse made of leather”
and that meant it came also to mean “supply of money, cash, funds”, extending
later to “pension”. The modern sense of “exchange
where stocks are registered and exchanged” dates from 1845, taken directly from
the Bourse de Paris (Paris stock
exchange). In one legend, the use of the
word “bourse” for such places was said to be derived from the House of Van der
Buerse, a family in Bruges, Belgium.
There, merchants and bankers would gather to conduct financial
transactions and the a variant of the name “Buerse” came to be used. The alternative history relates how there was
a sign on the front of the Buerse’s house adorned with a painting of three burses
(purses). Bourse is a noun; the noun
plural is bourses.
In French, bourse is also a slang term (usually in the
plural) for the scrotum and from gift-shops and street markets around the
world, one can buy coin purses (various with clasps, zips and tie-strings) made from the scrotums
of various slaughtered creatures. It
appears also in the (usually affectionate) French vulgarity: “Ça remonte à
quand, la dernière fois que tu t’es vidé les bourses?” (When was the
last time you emptied your balls? In
more polite use, there the bourse
d’études (educational scholarship, stipend, student allowance), bourse d’excellence (merit scholarship;
fellowship) and boursicaut (small
coin purse (mostly archaic though still a favorite among antique dealers).
One linguistic development in French might explain
something about why the fluctuations in financial markets came increasingly to
send ripples throughout economies: In the sixteenth century the verb boursicoter meant “to set money aside”
(ie keep it in one’s purse) but by the mid-nineteenth century (under the
influence of bourse coming to mean “stock exchange”, it had shifted to mean “having
a flutter on the markets; dabbling in the stock market”. In a similar vein, a boursier (feminine boursière,
masculine plural boursiers, feminine
plural boursières) could be (1) a scholarship
beneficiary, a recipient of a bursary or grant, (2) a stockbroker or trader or
(3) one who makes purses and handbags.
In idiomatic use (which survives as a literary device there was sans bourse délier (literally “without
opening one's purse”) which is English aligns with “without spending a penny”
or “not spending a dime”.
The Modern English purse was from the Middle English purse, from Old English pursa (little bag or pouch made of
leather, especially for carrying money), partly from pusa (wallet, bag, scrip) and partly from burse. The Old English pusa was from the Proto-West Germanic pusō, from the Proto-Germanic pusô (bag, sack, scrip), from the
primitive Indo-European būs- (to
swell, stuff) and was cognate with the Old High German pfoso (pouch, purse), the Low German pūse (purse, bag), the Old Norse posi (purse, bag), the Danish pose
(purse, bag) and the Dutch beurs (purse,
bag). The Old English burse was from the same source as the
French bourse. “Purse” (as a synecdoche for “financial
matters generally” is widely used in idiomatic English and persists in the UK
persists in the office of Keeper of the Privy Purse, a member of the royal
household who manages the financial affairs of the sovereign. The office dates from the early sixteenth
century (things in the palace don’t often change) and can be understood as
something like a CFO (chief financial officer) or FC (financial controller
(comptroller the historic use)). Purse
had been used in the sense of “the royal treasury” as early as the late
thirteenth century and the figurative sense of “money, means, resources, funds”
emerged by the mid-1300s, this extending to specific defined instances (such as
“prize for winning a horse race etc”) by the 1640s. The thirteenth century use in Middle English to
mean “scrotum” was indicative of the shape and size of the leather pouches used
to carry coins.
Lindsay Lohan illustrates the purse and the handbag: The clutch purse (left) would everywhere be understood as “a purse” but in the US such a thing commonly would be called “a clutch” because “purse” is used also of larger items. The red one (centre) would often be called a purse in the US but elsewhere in the English-speaking world it is certainly a handbag. By the time something assumes the dimensions of a Louis Vuitton Doctor's Bag (right), it is definitely a handbag, tote or something beyond a purse.
Purse was first used of a “woman's handbag” in the late 1870s. Originally a purse was “a small bag for
carrying money” and that use persisted even after purses became less
scrotum-like but in the US it came to be used also of what would in the UK be
called a “handbag” (a small bag carried usually by women and typically
containing personal items (lipsticks, other makeup and often a “purse” (in the
original sense)). Not infrequently, in trans-Atlantic
use, the terms “purse” and “handbag” are used interchangeably, but confusion
can arise if there’s no accompanying visual clue which is why the term “clutch
purse” has proved so useful. A clutch
purse is a small, often rectangular bag designed conveniently to be carried in
one hand (although many are supplied with an (often detachable) chain or strap which
can be slung over the shoulder or used in cross-body style. In the industry, not only is there no set of
parameters which defines where a purse ends and a handbag begins and
shamelessly manufacturers will use the labels indiscriminately if they suspect
it will stimulate sales. The US usage
has infected the rest of the world including places like the UK where once
there was a clear distinction and now it’s something really in the eye of the
beholder, perhaps recalling the judgment Potter Stewart (1915–1985; associate
justice of the US Supreme Court 1958-1981) handed down (in another context) in Jacobellis
v Ohio (378 U.S. 184 (1964)): “I shall not today attempt further to define… and perhaps
I could never succeed in intelligibly doing so. But I know it when I see it…”
About the only thing which can be guaranteed of a stock market
is it will fluctuate and the most famous terms used of bourses are “bear market”
& “bull market”, describing respectively the market conditions as they
respond to the central dynamics of the business: fear & greed, both of
which tend to manifest in waves because of what is known as the “herd mentality”
of investors (gamblers as some prefer to describe themselves). The collective noun for a group of bulls is a
herd (less commonly a gang while bears assemble (a less common behavior for
them) in a sloth (or sleuth). The bull
& bear metaphors have been in use since the early eighteenth century and the
origin of the “bull” is uncontested and refers to the habit aggressive bulls
display in pushing forward and tossing their heads upward, the idea being a herd
of “bullish investors” will drive up the prices of the stocks they’re pursuing,
thus creating a “bull market”. The math
of these terms is not precisely defined but, as a general principle, the view
seems to be they are used of a market in which prices rise (bull) of fall (bear)
20% or more from a recent trough or peak, usually over a period or weeks or
months depending on the state of an economy.
The labels can be applied to a single asset, an asset class, a group of
securities, or a market as a whole and if the trends are mild or seem
tentative, things can be called “bullish” or “bearish”.
The origin of the bestial analogy of the bear is
contested. The oldest story concerns the
London trader who sold a shipment of Canadian bearskins sometime before they had
come into his possession, his strategy being a gamble the market would fall and
he’d just have to pay less for something he’s already sold at a higher price,
thus gaining from “the spread” (the difference between the cost and selling
prices and a variation on the mechanism used today by the “short sellers”). These traders came to be known as “bearskin
jobbers”. The alternative history is
more directly from behavioral zoology: the way bears with their powerful limbs
and big, sharp claws will, if in the mood “claw stuff down”.
The use
may also have been influenced by the unfortunate history in England of bull and
bear-baiting, gruesome, fight-to-the-death contests between the beasts which
seem first to have been held during the thirteenth century and reaching an apex
of popularity during the reign of Elizabeth I (1533–1603; Queen of England
& Ireland 1558-1603). An audience
would bet on the outcome and the link with stock exchanges is that while
markets may percolate for sometimes long periods, there will always be battles
between “the bears” and “the bulls” and it’s during these events that great
fortunes are made and lost. The language
appealed to writers and was used by the English poet & satirist Alexander
Pope (1688-1744) in Book II of The
Dunciad (1728), a work mocking the greed and folly of investors (gamblers) associated
with the South Sea Bubble, a financial scandal of the early eighteenth century
and one of many examples of herd mentality and “irrational exuberance”:
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