Editing Sabotage (section)

== Etymology ==
The English word derives from the French word {{lang|fr|saboter}}, meaning to "bungle, botch, wreck or sabotage"; it was originally used to refer to labour disputes, in which workers wearing wooden shoes called {{lang|fr|[[Sabot (shoe)|sabot]]s}} interrupted production through different means. A [[false etymology|popular but incorrect account]] of the origin of the term's present meaning is the story that poor workers in the Belgian city of [[Liège]] would throw a wooden {{lang|fr|sabot}} into the machines to disrupt production.<ref name="etymonline">{{cite web |url=http://www.etymonline.com/index.php?term=sabotage |title=Sabotage  |website=Online Etymology Dictionary}}</ref>

One of the first appearances of {{lang|fr|saboter}} and {{lang|fr|saboteur}} in French literature is in the {{lang|fr|Dictionnaire du Bas-Langage ou manières de parler usitées parmi le peuple|italic=yes}} of d'Hautel, edited in 1808. In it the literal definition is to 'make noise with sabots' as well as 'bungle, jostle, hustle, haste'. The word {{lang|fr|sabotage}} appears only later.<ref>{{cite book |last=D'Hautel |first=Charles-Louis |date=1808 |title=Dictionnaire du Bas-Langage ou manières de parler usitées parmi le peuple |trans-title=Dictionary of slang or ways to speak used by the people |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=zT5p4cMNoWgC&pg=PA325 |language=fr |page=325 |publisher=D'Hautel et Schoell |quote={{lang|fr|Saboteur&thinsp;: Sobriquet injurieux qu'on donne à un mauvais ouvrier, qui fait tout à la hâte, et malproprement.}} }}</ref>

The word {{lang|fr|sabotage}} is found in 1873–1874 in the {{lang|fr|Dictionnaire de la langue française|italic=yes}} of [[Émile Littré]].<ref>{{cite book |first=Émile |last=Littré |title=Dictionnaire de la langue française |trans-title=Dictionary of the French language|publisher=Hachette |date=1873–1874 |page=1790 |url=http://gallica.bnf.fr/ark:/12148/bpt6k54066991/f401}}</ref> Here it is defined mainly as 'making sabots, sabot maker'. It is at the end of the 19th century that it really began to be used with the meaning of 'deliberately and maliciously destroying property' or 'working slower'. In 1897, [[Émile Pouget]], a famous [[syndicalist]] and [[anarchist]] wrote "{{lang|fr|action de saboter un travail}}" ('action of sabotaging or bungling a work') in {{lang|fr|Le Père Peinard|italic=yes}}<ref>{{cite book |last=Pouget |first=Émile |date=1976 |title=Le Père Peinard |url=http://www.editions-galilee.fr/f/index.php?sp=liv&livre_id=3033 |page=53 |publisher=Éditions Galilée |isbn=2718600306 |archive-date=16 July 2022 |access-date=18 October 2015 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220716093404/http://www.editions-galilee.fr/f/index.php?sp=liv&livre_id=3033 |url-status=dead }}</ref> and in 1911 he also wrote a book entitled {{lang|fr|Le Sabotage|italic=yes}}.<ref>{{cite book |last=Pouget |first=Émile |date=1911 |title=Le Sabotage |pages=3–66 |url=https://fr.wikisource.org/wiki/Le_Sabotage |publisher=Marcel Rivière}}</ref>