Français ponte, ou distinguer pour unir

Resum

Dictionaries of Modern French either distinguish between two homonymous masculine nouns ponte, or treat this form as a case of polysemy with two related meanings, depending on whether one or two etymons are ascribed. These words are terms from two card games that were introduced into France in the 17th century, hombre from Spain and bassette from Italy. The history of the vocabulary used for these two games in French shows that they gave rise to two different series of borrowings, so that the two ponte word-forms are homonyms: the hombre one was borrowed from Spanish punto, and the other one, from the game called bassette, was taken from the verb ponter to stake, bet', which is a borrowing from Italian puntare.