agitación

Forms

agitación f (plural agitaciones)^[1] The first record is spelt agitaçión;^[2][3] Terreros writes ajitación, and a text of 1778 from New Spain has the same spelling.^[2][3]

Etymology

It is borrowed from Latin agitātiō (“motion, shaking, agitation”), a learned word.^[4][1][2][5] The DTME notes that the Latin word was in use in Medieval Latin, reached French in 1355 and appears in Spanish in medical texts of the 15th century.^[5]

The Latin noun is formed from agitō (“to set in motion, drive, stir”) with the suffix -tiō.^[6][1] The verb, the source of agitar, recorded in Spanish from Juan Manuel, is a frequentative of agō (“to drive, do”).^[1][7][8] De Vaan traces that verb to Proto-Indo-European *h₂eǵ- (“to drive, lead”).^[8] The same Latin word is Catalan agitació, Portuguese agitação, French agitation and Italian agitazione.^[9]

Earliest recorded meaning

The first record is in Enrique de Villena's glosses to his translation of the Aeneid (1427–1428, in a copy of 1442), on rain that moistens the air and tempers the dryness that caused its agitaçión: the repeated movement of a fluid.^[2][10]

Semantic evolution

The physical sense came first and was long the main one, in medicine and natural science: the CDH has it in a translation of Gordonio's Lilio de medicina of 1495, and the historical dictionary quotes the agitation of the winds (1599) and of water in the belly (1606).^[10][2] The Academy's first dictionary, in 1726, defined it as the act of moving or the effect of movement.^[2] In the Americas it is recorded from 1778, also for the stirring of the sea (1779) and for the convulsions of the animal spirits (1795).^[3]

Today it also names a state of nervous excitement and restlessness, and political and social unrest or the stirring up of it.^[11][12][1] In psychology and medicine it is a disorder with disordered, confused bodily hyperactivity, often called agitación psicomotora.^[4][5]

Timeline

• 1427–1428 – Enrique de Villena's glosses to the Aeneid (in a copy of 1442).^[2][10]
• 1495 – the Spanish translation of Gordonio's Lilio de medicina.^[10]
• 1553 – Cristóbal Méndez's book on bodily exercise, the earliest text in the CDH known from a contemporary witness.^[10]
• 1599 – G. Rocamora writes of the agitation of the winds.^[2]
• 1726 – the Academy's first dictionary defines it.^[2]
• 1778 – the first record from the Americas, in New Spain.^[3]
• 1786 – Terreros spells it ajitación.^[2]
• 1899 – the Academy's dictionary gives the etymology from Latin.^[13]

Meanings

Noun

1. The action and effect of agitating: shaking, stirring; a series of rapid, violent movements: la agitación del mar.^[4][11]
2. restlessness, excitement, nervousness: Esperaba la llamada con creciente agitación.^[11][12][1]
3. Social or political unrest, and the stirring up of it.^[1][12]
4. (psychology) An emotional disorder marked by disordered and confused bodily hyperactivity.^[4][5]

Related words

• agitar
• Latin agitatio

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 g h i j 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. agitación
3. ^ a b c d 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. agitación
4. ^ 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. agitación
5. ^ a b c d Real Academia Nacional de Medicina (2011), Diccionario de términos médicos, Madrid: Editorial Médica Panamericana; online at https://dtme.ranm.es, p. s.v. agitación
6. ^ Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
7. ^ Corominas, Joan; Pascual, José A. (1980–1991), Diccionario crítico etimológico castellano e hispánico, 6 vols., Madrid: Gredos, p. 1, 43
8. ^ a b de Vaan, Michiel (2008), Etymological Dictionary of Latin and the other Italic Languages, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 7, Leiden; Boston: Brill
9. ^ Echegaray, Eduardo de (1887–1889), Diccionario general etimológico de la lengua española, 5 vols., Madrid: José María Faquineto, p. 141
10. ^ a b c d e Real Academia Española (2013–), Corpus del Diccionario histórico de la lengua española (CDH), version 3.1, https://apps.rae.es/CNDHE, p. s.v. agitación
11. ^ a b c Moliner, María (2007), Diccionario de uso del español, 3rd ed., Madrid: Gredos, p. s.v. agitación
12. ^ a b c Battaner Arias, Paz (dir.) (2017), Diccionario general de la lengua española VOX, Barcelona: Larousse Editorial, p. s.v. agitación
13. ^ Real Academia Española (1899), Diccionario de la lengua castellana, 13th ed., Madrid: Imprenta de los Sres. Hernando y Compañía, p. 26