acechar

Forms

acechar (first-person singular present acecho, first-person singular preterite aceché, past participle acechado)^[1] Old Spanish had the spellings asechar and assechar beside açechar, azechar and hazechar;^[1] assetar is recorded once, about 1350, and assenchar once, before 1425.^[2] The forms with ⟨s⟩ or ⟨ss⟩ are the oldest; after 1550 the historical dictionary found only 18 examples of them.^[2]

Etymology

It is inherited from Old Spanish asechar, inherited from Latin assector (“to follow constantly; to pursue”).^[3][4][5][1] The Latin verb is made of ad- and sector (“to follow; to hunt an animal”), the frequentative of sequor (“to follow”).^[3][6][1] Modern asechar, which kept the older ⟨s⟩, is a doublet.^[1][4]

Corominas finds no reliable example of the spelling with ⟨c⟩ before 1400: earlier ones come from editions that modernised the text, and in Berceo the manuscripts have the spelling with ⟨s⟩.^[3] He thinks the ⟨c⟩ came from contamination with the synonym celada (“ambush”) and the verb acelar, or perhaps from an Andalusian Arabic verb meaning “to lie in wait”.^[3] García de Diego sees a merger with Vulgar Latin *assediāre (“to besiege”), the source of Catalan assetjar.^[7] Corominas rejects this, denying that /dj/ could give /tʃ/.^[3]

Outside Spanish the same Latin verb survives only in Old Galician-Portuguese asseitar (“to lay snares”), which later disappeared.^[8][9] Corominas puts this down to its clash with aceitar (“to accept”).^[3] García de Diego adds Galician aseitar (“to follow with the eyes; to lay snares”), and the Aragonese law book Vidal Mayor has assettar.^[10][3]

Earliest recorded meaning

The verb first meant “to pursue relentlessly, to hound”: in the Libro de Alexandre (c. 1240–1250) evil serpents lie by the river banks assechan a las almas “hunting souls”.^[2][11] About 1270 the prose Historia troyana still used it in the Latin sense: Menelaus went about threatening Paris e asechándolo con sus caualleros “and pursuing him with his knights”.^[3][2]

Semantic evolution

Cuervo had already shown that the split between asechar “to lay snares” and acechar “to watch furtively” is not old: medieval and Golden Age authors used either spelling in both senses, and watching from hiding was felt as part of setting a trap.^[3][12][4] The form with ⟨c⟩ spread to both senses, but the noun kept the old spelling in asechanza “snare, plot”, while acecho came to mean “watching from hiding” or the place one watches from.^[3] Later usage tended to keep asechar for the older sense, with little effect, since asechar is now rare.^[3]

Covarrubias in 1611 derived it from Latin assectari, and rejected a fanciful compound of Latin acies “keenness of sight” and echar, on the ground that whoever lies in wait throws himself to the ground.^[13] The Diccionario de Autoridades defined it as watching with care from a hidden place, and recorded the proverb Quien acecha por agujero, ve su duelo “he who spies through a hole sees his own grief”, a warning against too much curiosity.^[14] The Academy's definition “to observe or wait cautiously with some purpose” dates from 1899 and is still the DLE's.^[15][5] Today the verb is also said of a danger or misfortune that threatens someone.^[16]

Timeline

• 1240–1250 – the Libro de Alexandre uses assechar “to hunt down”; the CDH's copy of the poem has açechar.^[2][17]
• before 1260 – the Escorial New Testament has assechandol “lying in wait for him”.^[17]
• c. 1270 – the Historia troyana uses asechar in the sense “to pursue”.^[3][2]
• c. 1400 – the first trustworthy examples of the spelling with ⟨c⟩, in manuscript A of Calila e Dimna.^[3]
• 1571 – first record in the Americas, in a vocabulary from Mexico City: escuchar acechando “to listen in secret”.^[18]
• 1611 – Covarrubias derives the verb from Latin assectari.^[13]
• 1726 – the Diccionario de Autoridades defines it as watching carefully from a hidden place.^[14]
• 1884 – the Academy's dictionary gives an etymology for the first time, from a and Latin sectari.^[19]

Meanings

Verb

1. (transitive) To watch or wait for someone or something cautiously and in secret, with some purpose, as a hunter or an enemy does: El gato acechaba al ratón detrás de la puerta.^[5][20][1]
2. (transitive) To lurk, stalk; to lie in wait for: Los lobos acechaban el rebaño desde el monte.^[1][5]
3. (figurative) Of a danger, doubt or misfortune: to threaten, to loom over someone: Un peligro nos acecha.^[16]

Word family

• acecho
• asechanza
• recechar
• acechador
• acechante
• acechanza

Related words

• asechar
• Latin assector
• Portuguese asseitar

Usage notes

The verb is kept apart from asechar “to lay snares”, which is rare; both go back to one Latin verb.^[3] The set phrase al acecho means “on the watch, in hiding”.^[21]

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 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. acechar
3. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n Corominas, Joan; Pascual, José A. (1980–1991), Diccionario crítico etimológico castellano e hispánico, 6 vols., Madrid: Gredos, p. 1, 29
4. ^ a b c Corominas, Joan (1973), Breve diccionario etimológico de la lengua castellana, 3rd ed., Madrid: Gredos, p. s.v. acechar
5. ^ a b c d 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. acechar
6. ^ Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
7. ^ García de Diego, Vicente (1985), Diccionario etimológico español e hispánico, 2nd ed., Madrid: Espasa-Calpe (1st ed. 1954), p. art. 748
8. ^ Machado, José Pedro (1987), Dicionário etimológico da língua portuguesa, 4th ed., 5 vols., Lisboa: Livros Horizonte, p. 330
9. ^ Houaiss, Antônio; Villar, Mauro de Salles (2001), Dicionário Houaiss da língua portuguesa, Rio de Janeiro: Objetiva, p. s.v. asseitar
10. ^ García de Diego, Vicente (1985), Diccionario etimológico español e hispánico, 2nd ed., Madrid: Espasa-Calpe (1st ed. 1954), p. art. 746
11. ^ 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. 88
12. ^ Cuervo, Rufino José (1886–1893), Diccionario de construcción y régimen de la lengua castellana, vols. I–II (A–D), París: A. Roger y F. Chernoviz, p. 1, 100
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. 58
14. ^ a b Real Academia Española (1726–1739), Diccionario de la lengua castellana (Diccionario de Autoridades), 6 vols., Madrid: Francisco del Hierro, p. 1, 42
15. ^ Real Academia Española (1899), Diccionario de la lengua castellana, 13th ed., Madrid: Imprenta de los Sres. Hernando y Compañía, p. 10
16. ^ a b Battaner Arias, Paz (dir.) (2017), Diccionario general de la lengua española VOX, Barcelona: Larousse Editorial, p. s.v. acechar
17. ^ 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. acechar
18. ^ 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. acechar
19. ^ Real Academia Española (1884), Diccionario de la lengua castellana, 12th ed., Madrid: Imprenta de D. Gregorio Hernando (the first Academy edition with etymologies), p. 11
20. ^ Moliner, María (2007), Diccionario de uso del español, 3rd ed., Madrid: Gredos, p. s.v. acechar
21. ^ Segura Munguía, Santiago (2014), Lexicón etimológico y semántico del latín y de las voces actuales que proceden de raíces latinas o griegas, Bilbao: Universidad de Deusto, p. 742