penedir-se

Forms

penedir-se (first-person singular present em penedeixo, first-person singular preterite em penedí, past participle penedit)^[1] The DCVB also records apenedir and repenedir, with prefixes that strengthen the verb.^[2] Around the Val d'Aran and the Alt Pallars empeneí is sometimes heard.^[3]

Etymology

It is inherited from Old Catalan penedir, which is inherited from Late Latin (sē) paenitīre, the Late Latin reflexive verb made from paeniteō (“to cause regret; to regret”) by a change to the fourth conjugation and recorded from the 7th century.^[1] Coromines, the DCVB, Bruguera and the GDLC give the classical verb as the etymon.^[3][2][4][5]

The troubadours wrote Old Occitan penedir, with the variants ⟨penedre⟩ and ⟨pentir⟩.^[6][3] The Latin verb also gave French repentir and Italian pentirsi.^[3]

Coromines explains that the /i/ of the Latin second syllable was regularly kept in Catalan and Occitan next to an /n/, as in mànega, so ⟨penedir⟩ is not a learned form.^[3] In the Middle Ages the verb was not inchoative: the present was ⟨penit⟩, and forms such as ⟨penedec⟩ and ⟨penidre⟩ in the Usatges point to a second-conjugation verb like the Occitan ⟨penedre⟩.^[3] The DCVB explains ⟨apenedir⟩ and ⟨repenedir⟩ from *adpoenitēre and *repoenitēre.^[2]

The Latin verb may be related to paene (“almost”) and paenūria (“shortage”).^[1][7]

Earliest recorded meaning

The first record is a document of 1242 from the Conca de Tremp: a writer complains that the church of Pui has lost a thousand alms through one man's fault and prays God to make him repent (penedir).^[3][4]

Semantic evolution

In Jaume I's Llibre de saviesa the speaker confesses to God and repents of all his sins, and Faraudo defines the medieval sense as true sorrow for a sin committed.^[8] Llull, the Vides de sants rosselloneses, Desclot and Saint Vincent Ferrer all use it, and the 15th-century Curial e Güelfa and Tirant lo Blanc have the general sense of regretting a choice.^[3][8]

The modern sense, being sorry for having done or not done something, is the one Fabra and the DIEC2 give.^[9][10] The DCVB also records the infinitive used as a noun, equivalent to penediment.^[2] Bruguera dates penediment to the 14th century, in Llull, and repenedit to Jaume Roig in 1460.^[4]

Timeline

• 1242 – a document from the Conca de Tremp.^[3][4]
• 1244 – Jaume I's Llibre de saviesa: me·m penit de tots mos peccats.^[8]
• 14th century – penediment in Llull.^[4]
• 1440 – Curial e Güelfa.^[8]
• 1458 – que·s peniden, in the record of the inquiry into the miracle of Solsona.^[3]
• 1460 – repenedit in Jaume Roig's Spill.^[4]
• 1932 – Fabra's dictionary heads the pronominal verb.^[9]

Meanings

Verb

1. (pronominal) To regret, be sorry for having done or not done something: Ens vam penedir de no haver-lo convidat.^[10][5][1]
2. (pronominal, religion) To repent of one's sins.^[8][1]

Word family

• penediment
• repenedit

Related words

• penitència
• penitent
• Latin paeniteō
• Old Occitan penedir

Usage notes

Coromines notes that the Castilianism arrepentir-se, which had spread in the 19th century, is now receding and was never accepted by good writers.^[3]

References

1. ^ a b c d e f g h Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ 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. penedir
3. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k 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. 6, 421
4. ^ a b c d e f Bruguera, Jordi (1996), Diccionari etimològic, Barcelona: Enciclopèdia Catalana, p. 695
5. ^ a b Enciclopèdia Catalana, Gran diccionari de la llengua catalana (GDLC), Barcelona: Enciclopèdia Catalana; online edition, https://www.diccionari.cat, p. s.v. penedir-se
6. ^ Stempel, Wolf-Dieter et al., Dictionnaire de l'occitan médiéval (DOM), Bayerische Akademie der Wissenschaften, https://dom-en-ligne.de, p. s.v. penedir
7. ^ Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
8. ^ a b c d e Faraudo de Saint-Germain, Lluís, Vocabulari de la llengua catalana medieval, online edition, Barcelona: Institut d'Estudis Catalans, p. s.v. penedir-se
9. ^ a b Fabra, Pompeu (1932), Diccionari general de la llengua catalana, Barcelona: Llibreria Catalònia, p. s.v. penedir-se
10. ^ a b 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. penedir-se