abstinencia

Forms

abstinencia f (plural abstinencias)^[1] Old Spanish wrote abstinençia and abstinencia, and also abstenencia, abstenençia, astenençia and astinençia.^[2][3] Abstenencia is found in the 14th century and still in Percyvall and Minsheu in 1599, astenençia in 1330, and astinencia is common in the Middle Ages and the 16th century and survives in vulgar speech.^[3]

Etymology

It is borrowed from Latin abstinentia (“restraint, abstention”), a learned word.^[4][1][5] Corominas lists it among the learned words of the family of tener, without a date in the DCECH and with 1444 in the BDELC.^[6][7] The CDH, the DEMel and the TDHLE have it two centuries earlier, in 13th-century poems.^[8][2][3]

The Latin noun is formed from abstinēns with the suffix -ia.^[9][1] The participle belongs to abstineō (“to keep away, hold back”), which is ab- and teneō (“to hold”).^[9][10] De Vaan explains the simple verb as a stative present to the root Proto-Indo-European *ten- (“to stretch”).^[11] In Medieval Latin the noun also meant “fasting, penance”.^[12]

The same Latin word was borrowed as Italian astinenza, French abstinence and English abstinence.^[5]

Earliest recorded meaning

The DEMel's first record is the Vida de Santa María Egipciaca of about 1215–1220.^[2] Berceo uses it in the Vida de Santo Domingo de Silos for the virtue of restraint: Ixo de buena ujda e de grant abstinençia “he came out of a good life and great abstinence”.^[3][13] The CDH dates that poem c. 1236 and knows it from a copy of the late 13th century.^[8]

Semantic evolution

In medieval texts the word is the virtue of denying oneself the pleasures of the body, above all food, drink and sex.^[3][13] The Libro del caballero Zifar (c. 1300) explains it as moderation in eating, drinking and speaking.^[3] In Alfonso X's Picatrix (1256) it is a ritual fast of seven days, which the DPCAX files under the religious sense.^[14]

The Diccionario de Autoridades called it a purely Latin word and gave two senses: any voluntary privation, and in particular going without meat on the days set by the Church or by a vow.^[15] The Academy's 1770 edition also used it for the day itself on which meat may not be eaten.^[16] Gaspar y Roig added a zoological sense, the ability of dormice and marmots to pass the winter without food.^[17]

In the 20th century it came to mean doing without a drug or other substance on which one depends, and the phrase síndrome de abstinencia names the symptoms that follow.^[18][19][4] The DTME gives sexual abstinence as a sense of its own.^[19]

Timeline

• c. 1215–1220 – the Vida de Santa María Egipciaca has abstine[n]çia.^[2]
• c. 1230 – Berceo's Vida de Santo Domingo de Silos uses it for the virtue of restraint.^[3]
• 1256 – Alfonso X's Picatrix is the CDH's first record in a manuscript of its own time.^[8][14]
• 1330 – the form astenençia is recorded.^[3]
• 1444 – the BDELC's date for the word.^[7]
• 1492 – Nebrija's Latin–Spanish dictionary renders Latin abstinentia with it.^[20]
• 1599 – Percyvall and Minsheu still give the form abstenencia.^[3]
• 1683 – the first record from the Americas, in the New Kingdom of Granada.^[21]
• 1726 – the Diccionario de Autoridades defines the general sense and abstaining from meat.^[15]
• 1853–1855 – Gaspar y Roig give the zoological sense.^[17]
• 1884 – the Academy's dictionary gives the etymology from Latin for the first time.^[22]

Meanings

Noun

1. abstinence: the act of refraining from something, especially from eating certain foods or taking drugs: Lleva tres años de abstinencia total.^[4][18][1]
2. (religion) Going without certain foods or drinks, especially meat, to keep a precept of the Church or a vow: Los viernes de Cuaresma son días de abstinencia.^[4][18]
3. Sexual continence.^[19]
4. (colloquial) The withdrawal symptoms of an addict, short for síndrome de abstinencia.^[19][18]

Related words

• abstener
• abstinente
• tener
• Latin abstinentia

Usage notes

Síndrome de abstinencia is the medical term for withdrawal syndrome.^[4][19]

References

1. ^ a b c d e Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d Diccionario del Español Medieval electrónico (DEMel), data publication 2026 (CC BY-SA), Universität Rostock, p. s.v. abstinencia
3. ^ a b c d e f g h i Real Academia Española (2021–), Tesoro de los diccionarios históricos de la lengua española (TDHLE): Diccionario histórico (1933–1936), its unpublished slips, Diccionario histórico (1960–1996), DHECan, DHECR, DHEVen, https://www.rae.es/tdhle, p. s.v. abstinencia
4. ^ a b c d e Real Academia Española; Asociación de Academias de la Lengua Española (2014–), Diccionario de la lengua española, 23rd ed., online version 23.8, https://dle.rae.es, p. s.v. abstinencia
5. ^ a b Segura Munguía, Santiago (2001), Nuevo diccionario etimológico latín-español y de las voces derivadas, Bilbao: Universidad de Deusto, p. 7
6. ^ Corominas, Joan; Pascual, José A. (1980–1991), Diccionario crítico etimológico castellano e hispánico, 6 vols., Madrid: Gredos, p. 5, 461
7. ^ a b Corominas, Joan (1973), Breve diccionario etimológico de la lengua castellana, 3rd ed., Madrid: Gredos, p. s.v. tener
8. ^ a b c Real Academia Española (2013–), Corpus del Diccionario histórico de la lengua española (CDH), version 3.1, https://apps.rae.es/CNDHE, p. s.v. abstinencia
9. ^ a b Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
10. ^ Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
11. ^ de Vaan, Michiel (2008), Etymological Dictionary of Latin and the other Italic Languages, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 7, Leiden; Boston: Brill
12. ^ Niermeyer, J. F. (1976), Mediae Latinitatis Lexicon Minus, Leiden: Brill
13. ^ a b Alonso Pedraz, Martín (1986), Diccionario medieval español: desde las Glosas Emilianenses y Silenses (s. X) hasta el siglo XV, 2 vols., Salamanca: Universidad Pontificia de Salamanca, p. 59
14. ^ a b Kasten, Lloyd A.; Nitti, John J.; Gago Jover, Francisco (2002–), Diccionario de la prosa castellana del Rey Alfonso X, New York: Hispanic Seminary of Medieval Studies (electronic edition 2024), p. s.v. abstinencia
15. ^ a b Real Academia Española (1726–1739), Diccionario de la lengua castellana (Diccionario de Autoridades), 6 vols., Madrid: Francisco del Hierro, p. 1, 27
16. ^ Real Academia Española (1770), Diccionario de la lengua castellana, 2nd ed., vol. I: A–B, Madrid: Joachín Ibarra, p. 1, 24
17. ^ a b Gaspar y Roig (eds.) (1853–1855), Biblioteca ilustrada de Gaspar y Roig: Diccionario enciclopédico de la lengua española, 2 vols., Madrid: Imprenta y Librería de Gaspar y Roig, p. 1, 23
18. ^ a b c d Moliner, María (2007), Diccionario de uso del español, 3rd ed., Madrid: Gredos, p. s.v. abstinencia
19. ^ a b c d e Real Academia Nacional de Medicina (2011), Diccionario de términos médicos, Madrid: Editorial Médica Panamericana; online at https://dtme.ranm.es, p. s.v. abstinencia
20. ^ Lleal, Coloma (dir.), DICCA-XV: Diccionario del castellano del siglo XV en la Corona de Aragón, Barcelona: Universitat de Barcelona, Grup d'Estudis d'Història de la Llengua (GHCL), https://ghcl.ub.edu/diccaxv, p. s.v. abstinencia
21. ^ Boyd-Bowman, Peter (2003), Léxico hispanoamericano 1493–1993, ed. Ray Harris-Northall and John J. Nitti, New York: Hispanic Seminary of Medieval Studies, p. s.v. abstinencia
22. ^ Real Academia Española (1884), Diccionario de la lengua castellana, 12th ed., Madrid: Imprenta de D. Gregorio Hernando (the first Academy edition with etymologies), p. 8