llarg

Forms

llarg (feminine llarga, masculine plural llargs, feminine plural llargues)^[1] Old Catalan wrote larc and larch.^[2][3] The DCVB records [ʎáɾk] and pronunciations with an open vowel, [ʎɛ́ɾk], Wiktionary gives [ˈʎaɾk] for Valencian.^[4][1]

Etymology

It is inherited from Old Catalan larch, which is inherited from Latin largus (“abundant, considerable; generous”).^{[2][4][5][6][1]}

In Vulgar Latin the adjective took the sense "wide" in some regions and "long" in others.^[4] The same Latin word is French large and Italian largo, "wide", while Spanish largo and Portuguese largo, like Catalan, mean "long"; the troubadours' Old Occitan larc meant "wide" and "generous".^[7][4][8]

In Catalan the word took over the field of the older llong very early, earlier than in Spanish, where the change was not complete until the 16th century.^[2][9] Llull still used the older word for length and kept this one mostly for "generous", but even he uses it of time.^[2]

The origin of the Latin adjective is unclear: an old proposal derives it from a form meaning "carrying fat", but de Vaan finds both the form and the meaning doubtful.^[10][1]

Earliest recorded meaning

Coromines dates the word to the origins of the language.^[2] Its commonest sense in Llull is "generous, liberal": in the Llibre de meravelles a king is savi, just, larc, and the generous merchant is set against the miser.^[2] In Lo Consili Llull tells the pope not to be miserly or lazy, mas larch e pros.^[3]

Semantic evolution

Length in time came first: royal chancery documents of 1316 and 1317 say that some words serien largues d’escriure, "would take long to write", and Llull asks why someone tires de larc offici e lonc sermó.^[2] The spatial sense of "long", opposed to ample "wide", is found at least from the early 14th century, in a description of galleys in the port of Malta.^[2] The old sense "generous" lived on in the dictionaries: Amengual (1858) still gives "abundant" and "liberal".^[11]

Set phrases are old: de larch e de travers "lengthwise and crosswise" in an inventory of 1413, al larch de la ribera "along the shore" in Perpignan letters, and a whale measured de larch at 21 or 22 paces in 1459.^[3] Roig uses llarch as an adverb, "at length".^[3] The derivatives llarguesa (Llull), allargar (Muntaner) and llargària (1379) are medieval.^[5] Dialects also use the word as an adverb meaning "far".^[4][1]

Timeline

• Late 13th century – Llull's larc, “generous”.^[2][3]
• 1316 – largas d’escriure in a chancery document.^[2]
• 14th century – allargar in Muntaner.^[5]
• 1379 – the derivative llargària.^[5]
• 1413 – de larch e de travers in the inventory of Alfonso the Magnanimous.^[3]
• 1460 – Roig's adverb llarch.^[3]
• 1858 – Amengual's dictionary still gives “liberal”.^[11]
• 1932 – Fabra heads the noun llarg, “length”.^[12]

Meanings

Adjective

1. long, of considerable length from end to end: un passadís llarg.^[13][6]
2. Measuring a given length: una corda llarga de deu metres.^[13]
3. Longer than normal: braços llargs.^[13]
4. Lasting a long time: un hivern llarg;^[1] a la llarga: in the long run.^[13][6]
5. (figurative) Quick to act or to understand.^[6][4]
6. (phonetics) Of a vowel or syllable, long.^[6]
7. (archaic) Abundant; generous.^[4]

Noun

1. length: un camp de cent metres de llarg;^[1] al llarg de: along, throughout;^[1] passar de llarg: to go by without stopping.^[13]
2. (music) A slow tempo, largo.^[13]

Adverb

1. At length: Avui el mestre ha parlat llarg.^[13]
2. (dialectal) far.^[4][1]

Word family

• allargar
• allargament
• llargada
• llargament
• llargària
• llarguesa
• llarguejar

Related words

• llong
• Latin largus
• Spanish largo
• French large
• Old Occitan larc

References

1. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ 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. 5, 83
3. ^ 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. llarg
4. ^ a b c d e f g h Alcover, Antoni M.; Moll, Francesc de B. (1930–1962), Diccionari català-valencià-balear, 10 vols., Palma de Mallorca: Moll, p. s.v. llarg
5. ^ a b c d Bruguera, Jordi (1996), Diccionari etimològic, Barcelona: Enciclopèdia Catalana, p. 534
6. ^ a b c d e Enciclopèdia Catalana, Gran diccionari de la llengua catalana (GDLC), Barcelona: Enciclopèdia Catalana; online edition, https://www.diccionari.cat, p. s.v. llarg
7. ^ Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter, p. 4913
8. ^ Stempel, Wolf-Dieter et al., Dictionnaire de l'occitan médiéval (DOM), Bayerische Akademie der Wissenschaften, https://dom-en-ligne.de, p. s.v. larc
9. ^ Corominas, Joan; Pascual, José A. (1980–1991), Diccionario crítico etimológico castellano e hispánico, 6 vols., Madrid: Gredos, p. 3, 586
10. ^ de Vaan, Michiel (2008), Etymological Dictionary of Latin and the other Italic Languages, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 7, Leiden; Boston: Brill
11. ^ a b Amengual, Juan José (1858), Nuevo diccionario mallorquín-castellano-latín, Palma de Mallorca, p. s.v. llarg
12. ^ Fabra, Pompeu (1932), Diccionari general de la llengua catalana, Barcelona: Llibreria Catalònia, p. s.v. llarg
13. ^ 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. llarg