collir

Forms

collir (first-person singular present cullo, first-person singular preterite collí, past participle collit)^[1] Old Catalan wrote collir and cullir, with forms such as cuyliràs;^[2][3] Faraudo heads the verb collir with cullir beside it.^[2][3] The stressed forms of the present have /u/: cullo, culls, cull, cullen, beside collim, colliu.^[4] The DCVB records pronunciations from [kuʎí] and [koʎí] to [koʎíɾ] and [kuʎíɾ], forms without the palatal such as [koí], [kuí] and [koví], and a prefixed [akuʎí].^[5]

Etymology

It is inherited from Latin colligō (“to gather together, collect”), infinitive ⟨colligere⟩.^{[3][5][6][7][1]} The Latin verb is formed with con- and legō (“to gather, pick; to read”).^[8][1]

The same Latin verb is Occitan culhir, French cueillir, Italian cogliere, Spanish coger and Portuguese colher.^[1] The learned words col·lecció and col·lecta come from the same Latin family.^[6][1]

Coromines notes that ⟨colligere⟩ had a very wide range of senses in Latin and only began to narrow, in the Silver Age, towards the ones that later prevailed in Catalan; the sense “to pick up from the ground” is not found before Quintilian.^[3] Catalan restricted the verb more than the other Romance languages, which keep a greater variety of senses or specialised it in other directions; the older language and some conservative local speech kept a wider range, closer to the Latin uses, which Coromines does not ascribe to foreign influence.^[3]

Earliest recorded meaning

The first record in CICA is in the Furs de València (1261–1271).^[9] Coromines quotes the Costums de Tortosa, Sement sembraràs en la terra e poc ne cuyliràs “you will sow seed in the earth and gather little of it”, and Llull's hermit qui collia de les herbes ab què vivia “who was gathering the herbs he lived on”.^[3] In these first records the verb means to gather or pick the fruits of the earth.^[3][2]

Semantic evolution

Llull uses the verb for picking flowers and fruit, often figuratively: flors d'amors cull “he picks flowers of love”.^[10] In the 14th and 15th centuries it also meant to levy or collect taxes and dues: the council of Valencia was allowed in 1345 to cullir e levar a toll at the grain exchange.^[2] The DCVB adds the old senses of collecting a tribute and of taking a woman out of spinsterhood, that is, marrying her.^[5]

The dictionaries of the early 19th century treated collir as old and headed the verb under cullir, the form of the stressed present.^[11][12] The Valencian dictionaries kept collir, for harvesting and for taking hold of something with the hand.^[13][14] Fabra's dictionary of 1932 made collir the standard form.^[15]

Coromines finds the use in Aribau's Oda, cull del mur sagrat la lira, a legitimate archaism rather than a foreign calque.^[3] Old derivatives are recollir (1237), collita (1386), collidor (1405) and escollir (1460, Roig).^[6]

Timeline

• 1261–1271 – the Furs de València, the first record in CICA.^[9]
• 13th century – the Costums de Tortosa have cuyliràs, Llull collia.^[3]
• 1345 – the council of Valencia is allowed to cullir a toll on grain.^[2]
• 1381 – the council of Castelló pays a man per collir los deutes de la vila.^[2]
• 1803 – Esteve, Bellvitges and Juglà mark collir as old and refer to cullir.^[11]
• 1932 – Fabra's Diccionari general heads the verb collir.^[15]

Meanings

Verb

1. To pick a flower, fruit or sprig from the plant: Vam collir figues de l'arbre del pati.^[4][7]
2. To harvest, gather in the crops of the soil: Al setembre es cullen els raïms.^[4][7]; collir arreu, to harvest everything, leaving nothing.^[4]
3. To pick up things scattered on the ground, to gather them in one place.^[4][7]
4. To pick up something that has fallen, to put it back in its place.^[4][7]
5. (figurative) To catch and retain what someone says, to take a hint.^[4][7]
6. (obsolete) To levy or collect taxes or dues.^[2][5]

Word family

• acollir
• collidor
• collita
• colliter
• escollir
• recollir
• recollida
• recull

Related words

• col·lecció
• col·lecta
• Latin colligō
• Spanish coger
• Occitan culhir

References

1. ^ a b c d e f g h Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g Faraudo de Saint-Germain, Lluís, Vocabulari de la llengua catalana medieval, online edition, Barcelona: Institut d'Estudis Catalans, p. s.v. collir
3. ^ a b c d e f g h i 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. 2, 831
4. ^ a b c d e f g 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. collir
5. ^ a b c d Alcover, Antoni M.; Moll, Francesc de B. (1930–1962), Diccionari català-valencià-balear, 10 vols., Palma de Mallorca: Moll, p. s.v. collir
6. ^ a b c Bruguera, Jordi (1996), Diccionari etimològic, Barcelona: Enciclopèdia Catalana, p. 225
7. ^ a b c d e f Enciclopèdia Catalana, Gran diccionari de la llengua catalana (GDLC), Barcelona: Enciclopèdia Catalana; online edition, https://www.diccionari.cat, p. s.v. collir
8. ^ Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
9. ^ a b Torruella, Joan; Pérez Saldanya, Manuel; Martines, Josep (dirs.), Corpus Informatitzat del Català Antic (CICA), https://www.cica.cat, p. s.v. collir
10. ^ Nou glossari general lul·lià (NGGL), Centre de Documentació Ramon Llull, Universitat de Barcelona, https://nggl.ub.edu, p. s.v. collir
11. ^ a b Esteve, Joaquim; Bellvitges, Josep; Juglà, Antoni (1803–1805), Diccionario catalán-castellano-latino, 2 vols., Barcelona, p. s.v. collir
12. ^ Labèrnia, Pere (1839–1840), Diccionari de la llengua catalana ab la correspondencia castellana y llatina, 2 vols., Barcelona, p. s.v. collir
13. ^ Escrig, José (1851), Diccionario valenciano-castellano, Valencia, p. s.v. collir
14. ^ Martí Gadea, Joaquim (1891), Novísimo diccionario general valenciano-castellano, Valencia, p. s.v. collir
15. ^ a b Fabra, Pompeu (1932), Diccionari general de la llengua catalana, Barcelona: Llibreria Catalònia, p. s.v. collir