Reading something or other this morning, BH came across the interesting fact that the word chauffeur originally meant someone who tended the engine, that is to say the fire, of a steam driven car. Obvious enough given the fire flavoured French verb chauffer, but it had never struck me before.
Consulting Littré (in print), I find confirmation that a chauffeur is a person who minds the fire, in particular the fire of a blacksmith's forge and by extension the fires of steam engines, but nothing about driving the cars of today. And, curiously, the sort of highwayman who toasts the feet of his victims until they reveal where the swag is to be found.
While a chauffeuse is a sort of low chair on which one can sit nice and close to the fire in the winter.
However, consulting Linguee (online), I find that a chauffeur does indeed drive cars, presumably not invented at the time that Littré was compiled. Digging deeper, a person who drives a horse and cart is a roulier, perhaps a conducteur. That is to say someone who rolls along, or perhaps someone who leads. Our undertakers have conductors too.
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