Geology and mining

Le stérile is a heap of rock, and the word for it is an adjective with nothing else attached. French sets a definite article in front of stérile, barren, and the phrase now names the stuff: the rock that carries no metal, shovelled aside and left in tips beside the workings. English cannot do that here. « Sterile » and « barren » stay adjectives, and the language has to fetch a noun for them to lean on — « waste rock », « barren ground », « spoil ». The French habit is general, and this list uses it twice: les morts-terrains, literally the dead grounds, is the overburden stripped off before the seam is reached. Away from the mine the same move gives le vide, empty space, le neuf, new things as a class, and l’essentiel, what matters. English allows a narrow version of it and keeps it for people and abstractions — « the poor », « the unknown », « the sublime ». A pile of rubble is exactly where the two part company: French is content to call it the barren, and English is not.