Origination of the term "vaudeville"

[occ]

I don’t know if this has been covered before in the MB’s, but I don’t see it in the SD archives anywhere. What exactly is the origination of the term “vaudeville”? Was it named after an actual place, or is the “ville” suffix unrelated?

[andros]

From The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Third Edition copyright © 1992 by Houghton Mifflin Company:

French, alteration of Old French vaudevire, occasional or topical light popular song, possibly short for chanson du Vau de Vire, song of Vau de Vire, a valley of northwest France and or perhaps : dialectal vauder, to go + virer, to turn

Take yer pick.

-andros-

[krish]

A little advice: use a search engine.

Search engines have proved useful tools. Whereas, the rest of my advice has no basis more reliable than the following site. I will despense this advice now.

Source:

originally a light song, derived from the drinking and love songs formerly attributed to Olivier Basselin and called Vau, or Vaux, de Vire.

But trust me on the search engine.

[Earl_Snake-Hips_Tucker]

I thought it was named after the prominent “Hotel Vaudeville” located in the “Borscht Belt.”

[system]

I’m curious about the origin of the word origination.

[Beruang]

The Random House Word of the Day for October 27, 1999 gives a very full explanation.
http://www.randomhouse.com/jesse/