aburrir

Forms

aburrir (first-person singular present aburro, first-person singular preterite aburrí, past participle aburrido)^[1] Old Spanish had aborrir and auorrir beside aburrir.^[2][3] Forms with a stressed vowel always have u (aburro), and so do the unstressed forms before a diphthong (aburrieron); the other unstressed forms keep o (aborrido, aborrí) into the first third of the 17th century, while aburrir and aburrido appear from the mid-16th century and become general in the 17th.^[2] A vulgar form agurrir is recorded in a text of 1951.^[2]

Etymology

It is inherited from Vulgar Latin *abhorriō, from Latin abhorreō (“to shrink back from, shun”), derived from horreō (“to bristle, shudder”).^[3][4][5][1] Corominas calls it a semi-learned word in Castilian, as Nebrija's spelling with ⟨b⟩ shows; only Catalan avorrir is fully popular.^[3] The verb aborrecer, recorded about 950, comes from the late derivative Late Latin abhorrēscō, and through the Middle Ages and the 16th century both kept the Latin sense, as synonyms.^[4][3]

The Latin verb is formed from ab- (“away from”) and the verb for “to bristle”.^[1][6] De Vaan traces that verb to Proto-Italic *χors-ē- (“to be stiff”), a stative of PIE origin, with cognates in Sanskrit verbs meaning “to be delighted, excited”.^[7] Wiktionary gives the root as Proto-Indo-European *ǵʰers- (“to bristle”).^[1]

García de Diego lists the form aborrir for Old Castilian, and also for Portuguese, Galician, Leonese, Salamancan and Catalan.^[8] The Cantigas de Santa María have Old Galician-Portuguese avorrido and several examples of avorrecer.^[3]

Earliest recorded meaning

Berceo uses the verb in the Latin sense “to abhor, reject, renounce”: in the Vida de Santo Domingo de Silos (about 1236, in a late 13th-century copy) por salvar las almas el mundo aburriestes, “to save souls you renounced the world”, and in the Vida de San Millán the martyrs qe por salvar las almas las carnes aburrieron, “who to save their souls spurned their flesh”.^[9][10] Alfonso X's General Estoria (1272–1275) uses the participle aborrido for a people that is “hated” by the others.^[11]

Semantic evolution

Old Spanish aburrir meant “to abhor, hate”.^[3][10] From this came “to abandon”, found in the early 15th century (aborrecer already comes close to it in the Libro de Alexandre), and then “to throw away, drive off”.^[3] In the 16th century the reflexive aburrirse took the modern meaning “to be bored, weary”.^[3][4][12] The transitive aburrir “to bore, annoy” was drawn from it, recorded in Moreto (died 1669).^[3][4][12] The verb seems to have been vulgar at times: it is unusually frequent in Juan del Encina and the rustic speech of his imitators, and Ayala (1693–1729) called it a coarse, plebeian word.^[2]

Covarrubias in 1611 glossed aburrir as “to abhor” and aburrido as someone discontented with himself, resentful and half desperate.^[13] Autoridades in 1726 defined it as grieving someone so much that he almost comes to hate himself, quoting Acosta on pacos (alpacas) that become sullen under their load.^[14] The Academy's 1770 dictionary added the familiar sense “to risk or spend money or time on some gain or amusement”, and the use of birds that abandon their nest, eggs or young.^[15] The sense “to abhor” was marked as obsolete there, and today the senses “to tire, annoy” and “to be bored” lead.^[15][5]

Timeline

• c. 1230–1236 – Berceo uses aburrir / aborrir for “to abhor, renounce”.^[9][10][3]
• 1272–1275 – the General Estoria of Alfonso X uses aborrido “hated”.^[11]
• c. 1495 – Nebrija refers aborrir to aborrecer.^[16]
• 16th century – the reflexive aburrirse takes the sense “to be bored”.^[3][4]
• 1599 – first record of aburrimiento.^[4]
• 1608 – first records in the Americas, in Lima, for leaving a wife and for birds abandoning their eggs.^[17]
• 1611 – Covarrubias glosses it as “to abhor”.^[13]
• before 1669 – Moreto uses the transitive aburrir “to annoy, bore”.^[3]
• 1770 – the Academy adds the senses “to spend money or time” and “to abandon a nest”.^[15]

Meanings

Verb

1. To bore, tire or annoy: Esa serie me aburre muchísimo.^[5][1][18]
2. (reflexive, aburrirse) To get bored or tired of something: Los niños se aburrieron en la reunión.^[5][1]
3. (reflexive, aburrirse) To feel the dullness that comes from lack of stimulus or amusement.^[5]
4. Of some animals: to abandon eggs or young (aborrecer).^[5][19]
5. (colloquial, obsolete) To waste or throw away something, especially time or money.^[5][18]
6. (obsolete) To abhor, hate.^[5][18]

Word family

• aburrimiento
• aburrido
• aburridor

Related words

• aborrecer
• horror
• Latin abhorreō
• Catalan avorrir
• English abhor

Usage notes

In Andalusia (Úbeda) aburrir has been recorded for “to mock, jeer at”, and in Mexico for wearing someone down to desperation.^[20][21] Spanish now separates aburrir “to bore” from aborrecer “to hate”, a distinction that does not appear before the 16th century.^[4]

References

1. ^ a b c d e f g Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d 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. aburrir
3. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l Corominas, Joan; Pascual, José A. (1980–1991), Diccionario crítico etimológico castellano e hispánico, 6 vols., Madrid: Gredos, p. 1, 25
4. ^ a b c d e f g Corominas, Joan (1973), Breve diccionario etimológico de la lengua castellana, 3rd ed., Madrid: Gredos, p. s.v. aburrir
5. ^ a b c d e f g h 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. aburrir
6. ^ Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
7. ^ de Vaan, Michiel (2008), Etymological Dictionary of Latin and the other Italic Languages, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 7, Leiden; Boston: Brill
8. ^ García de Diego, Vicente (1985), Diccionario etimológico español e hispánico, 2nd ed., Madrid: Espasa-Calpe (1st ed. 1954), p. s.v. abhorrere
9. ^ a b Real Academia Española (2013–), Corpus del Diccionario histórico de la lengua española (CDH), version 3.1, https://apps.rae.es/CNDHE, p. s.v. aburrir
10. ^ a b c 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. 65
11. ^ 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. aburrir
12. ^ a b Bénaben, Michel (2000), Dictionnaire étymologique de l'espagnol, Paris: Ellipses, p. s.v. aburrir
13. ^ a b Covarrubias Orozco, Sebastián de (1611), Tesoro de la lengua castellana o española, Madrid: Luis Sánchez (Biblioteca Wordkers transcription, CC BY 4.0), p. 52
14. ^ Real Academia Española (1726–1739), Diccionario de la lengua castellana (Diccionario de Autoridades), 6 vols., Madrid: Francisco del Hierro, p. 1, 29
15. ^ a b c Real Academia Española (1770), Diccionario de la lengua castellana, 2nd ed., vol. I: A–B, Madrid: Joachín Ibarra, p. 1, 27
16. ^ 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. aburrir
17. ^ 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. aburrir
18. ^ a b c Moliner, María (2007), Diccionario de uso del español, 3rd ed., Madrid: Gredos, p. s.v. aburrir
19. ^ Battaner Arias, Paz (dir.) (2017), Diccionario general de la lengua española VOX, Barcelona: Larousse Editorial, p. s.v. aburrir
20. ^ Alcalá Venceslada, Antonio (1951), Vocabulario andaluz, Madrid: Real Academia Española, p. 667
21. ^ Santamaría, Francisco J. (1959), Diccionario de mejicanismos, México: Porrúa, p. 12