arribar

Forms

arribar (first-person singular present arribo, first-person singular preterite arribí, past participle arribat)^[1] The DCVB records the pronunciations [əriβá], [riβá], [ariβá] and [ariβáɾ].^[2]

Etymology

It is inherited from Vulgar Latin *arrīpō (“to come to the shore”), formed on Latin rīpa (“bank, shore”).^[2][3][4] Wiktionary gives the Early Medieval Latin form as adrīpō, which Niermeyer glosses “to land”;^[1][5][6] Du Cange explains it as “to put in to the bank”.^[1][5][6] The GDLC derives the Catalan verb from riba, and Coromines and Bruguera treat it among the derivatives of that noun; synchronically it is from Catalan a- + riba + -ar.^[7][8][9][1]

The same verb is French arriver, Occitan arribar, Spanish arribar and Portuguese arribar; in Spanish and Portuguese it means “to land”.^[4] The Italian arrivare is borrowed from French.^[4]

Earliest recorded meaning

Coromines dates the first record to the 13th century, in Jaume I's account of the landing on Mallorca: the king's men were to land wherever they judged it good for the fleet to put in (al estol arribar).^[8] At first the verb meant only “to bring a ship to shore, to land”.^[8] In Llull's Doctrina pueril Noah and those with him come to land.^[3]

Semantic evolution

As in Occitan, French, Italian and English, the verb widened from landing to any arrival.^[8] It was also transitive, “to bring (a boat or timber) to shore”, in Tortosa in 1344, and “to bring someone to a place” in the Catalan Decameron.^[8] The modern sense is rare in the old texts, though Llull already writes of messengers who came to the court of the Lion, and it is fully developed in a dictionary of 1647.^[8] Faraudo cites galleys that reach Sicily in the Tirant lo Blanc (1460) and a lord who has arrived at Fraga on foot in 1461.^[10]

Labèrnia still gives the ship that enters port first, then anyone arriving, and a nautical sense, turning the bow towards where the wind blows.^[11] Today it is the general and only word for “arrive” over the whole language area.^[8] The DCVB notes that in Catalonia the reflexive arribar-se “to go to a nearby place” imitates Castilian.^[2]

Timeline

• 13th century – first record, in Jaume I's account of the landing on Mallorca.^[8]
• 1275–1299 – Desclot's chronicle.^[12]
• 1344 – transitive “to bring timber to shore” in a document of Tortosa.^[8]
• 1460 – the Tirant lo Blanc: galleys reach the cape of Sicily.^[10]
• 1461 – the Dietaris de la Generalitat: a lord arrives at Fraga on foot.^[10]
• 1647 – a dictionary has the modern sense fully developed.^[8]
• 1839 – Labèrnia lists the nautical and general senses.^[11]

Meanings

Verb

1. To arrive, to reach a place at the end of a journey: El tren de Lleida arriba a les nou.^[13][7][1]
2. Of a thing: to reach its destination.^[7][14]
3. (pronominal) To go briefly to a nearby place.^[13][7][2]
4. (figurative) To attain a goal or a position.^[13][7]
5. (with a + infinitive) To go so far as to, to manage to.^[13]
6. Of a time: to come.^[7][14]
7. To reach (a height, a level, an amount).^[7][2]
8. To happen, to come about.^[2][1]
9. (nautical, dated) To come ashore, to put in.^[2][11]

Word family

• arribada

Related words

• riba
• Latin rīpa
• French arriver
• Spanish arribar

Usage notes

The DIEC2 records arribar i moldre, to finish something soon after starting it.^[13]

References

1. ^ a b c d e f g h i j Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g Alcover, Antoni M.; Moll, Francesc de B. (1930–1962), Diccionari català-valencià-balear, 10 vols., Palma de Mallorca: Moll, p. s.v. arribar
3. ^ a b Nou glossari general lul·lià (NGGL), Centre de Documentació Ramon Llull, Universitat de Barcelona, https://nggl.ub.edu, p. s.v. arribar
4. ^ a b c Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter, p. 675
5. ^ a b Niermeyer, J. F. (1976), Mediae Latinitatis Lexicon Minus, Leiden: Brill, p. s.v. adripare
6. ^ a b du Cange, Charles du Fresne, et al. (1883–1887), Glossarium mediae et infimae latinitatis, augmented ed. by Léopold Favre, Niort: L. Favre, p. s.v. adripare
7. ^ a b c d e f g Enciclopèdia Catalana, Gran diccionari de la llengua catalana (GDLC), Barcelona: Enciclopèdia Catalana; online edition, https://www.diccionari.cat, p. s.v. arribar
8. ^ a b c d e f g h i j Coromines, Joan (1980–2001), Diccionari etimològic i complementari de la llengua catalana, 10 vols., Barcelona: Curial / La Caixa (online ed., Institut d'Estudis Catalans 2024), p. 7, 306
9. ^ Bruguera, Jordi (1996), Diccionari etimològic, Barcelona: Enciclopèdia Catalana, p. 797
10. ^ a b c Faraudo de Saint-Germain, Lluís, Vocabulari de la llengua catalana medieval, online edition, Barcelona: Institut d'Estudis Catalans, p. s.v. arribar
11. ^ a b c Labèrnia, Pere (1839–1840), Diccionari de la llengua catalana ab la correspondencia castellana y llatina, 2 vols., Barcelona, p. s.v. arribar
12. ^ Torruella, Joan; Pérez Saldanya, Manuel; Martines, Josep (dirs.), Corpus Informatitzat del Català Antic (CICA), https://www.cica.cat, p. s.v. arribar
13. ^ a b c d e Institut d'Estudis Catalans (2007), Diccionari de la llengua catalana, 2nd ed. (DIEC2), Barcelona: Edicions 62; online edition with later updates, https://dlc.iec.cat, p. s.v. arribar
14. ^ a b Fabra, Pompeu (1932), Diccionari general de la llengua catalana, Barcelona: Llibreria Catalònia, p. s.v. arribar