Meaning
Originally the word came from the kind of terrain in which the armed resistance groups hid, the type of high ground in southeastern France covered with scrub growth. Although strictly meaning thicket, maquis could be roughly translated as "the bush".
Members of those bands were called maquisards. The term became an honorific that meant "armed resistance fighter". The Maquis have come to symbolize the French Resistance. They helped British agents in sabotage, spying, and misinformation.
Read more about this topic: Maquis (World War II)
Famous quotes containing the word meaning:
“Semantically, taste is rich and confusing, its etymology as odd and interesting as that of “style.” But while style—deriving from the stylus or pointed rod which Roman scribes used to make marks on wax tablets—suggests activity, taste is more passive.... Etymologically, the word we use derives from the Old French, meaning touch or feel, a sense that is preserved in the current Italian word for a keyboard, tastiera.”
—Stephen Bayley, British historian, art critic. “Taste: The Story of an Idea,” Taste: The Secret Meaning of Things, Random House (1991)
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