From unjamming to broken tables, an etymological reflection on the failing of banks

The March 2023 collapse of the Silicon Valley Bank sent me down an etymology rabbit hole. Though admittedly I’m prone to prowl etymological coney warrens at the slightest provocation. This particular spot of spelunking was prompted by the word used to describe the state of the SVB in the Dutch newspaper Financieel Dagblad i.e. deconfiture.

Deconfiture is, as is apparent, a French word used in Dutch to express, in general, a failure and, in particular, a failure to pay which brings us to the specific meaning of bankruptcy. Now before looking a the marvel of that word, let’s first examine this Frenchie in Dutch clothing.

Deconfiture comes from de “un” + confire “to prepare, to assemble” which in turn comes from con “with” + facere “to make”. Hence it is an unmaking or disassembly of something and is in this particular case, the unmaking of a bank.

On a side note, confiture in Dutch means jam (as in the sweet spread made from fruit and sugar) which has the identical etymological root going back to the preparation of the sweet bread spread. So if one where to take the liberty of mixing languages and metaphors which I certainly intend to do, one could say that deconfiture relates the unjamming of banks.

Now let’s look at this pile of sand of a word called bank. The earliest meaning of bank was “a small hill” from which the meanings of “natural earthen incline bordering a body of water” and “rising ground in a sea or rover, shoal” as in sandbank is only a hop, skip and a jump a way.

From from “small hill” the meaning also evolved into something to sit on, as in a bench. Bank in Dutch means sofa and is also used in words such as rechtbank meaning courthouse as in the seat of law.

Just as some raised ground can be sat on, it can also be used as something to work on, as in a table. In Dutch -bank is used in various composite words to describe various versions of tables. A werkbank is a table to work on, a toonbank is table to show one’s wares on, and a winkelbank is store table or store counter. 

With the growing role of the Italians in the transfer of money trade in the 15th and 16th century, the semantic narrowing continued in which the Italian banco comes to be referred to as the “store table/counter” used in the exchange of money. And with that it soon also become the name of the place at which a lot money is located. The Italian word found its way into English and Dutch as lives on in composite words such as blood bank, data bank and sperm bank as indications of locations where stuffs are kept in large quantities.

Now back to the jam. Bankruptcy or bankroet in Dutch comes from the Italian banca rotta which refers to the figurative rupture or breaking of the table used in the transfer of money when this is no longer possible as the particular business venture of the owner of said table failed and met its terminal end. The visually pleasing explanation of breaking the money table by smashing it with a big mallet seems to be, alas, apocryphal.

So, in conclusion: when the money table ruptures the jam comes undone.