anticipar

Forms

anticipar (first-person singular present anticipo, first-person singular preterite anticipé, past participle anticipado)^[1] The variant antecipar was used from the 15th to the 17th century and survives in some dialects;^[1] antiscipar and antizipar are rare old spellings.^[2]

Etymology

It is a learned word, borrowed from Latin anticipō (“to take beforehand, anticipate”).^[3][4][5][1] The Latin verb is built on ante- (“before”) and capiō (“to take”).^[6][7] Wiktionary takes it as a denominal verb from an unrecorded *anticeps, like mancipō from manceps and participō from particeps, or as formed directly on the model of these verbs.^[1] Bénaben also names the verb meaning “to partake” as a possible model.^[8] Covarrubias derived it from the Latin preposition and incipiō (“to begin”).^[9] Catalan anticipar, French anticiper and Italian anticipare are the same borrowing.^[10]

Earliest recorded meaning

The first record without a later copy is the Spanish translation of the Historia de Jerusalem abreviada of Jacobo de Vitriaco (after 1350), on a man who may die before his time or anteçiparlo “bring it forward”.^[11] The CDH has an earlier hit in Pedro de Cuéllar's Catecismo of 1325, but its text survives in a copy of 1472.^[11] A Bible of about 1400 has Antiçipemos fazer paz con él “let us make peace with him first”.^[2][12] The DCECH and the BDELC date the word to 1444, in Juan de Mena.^[3][4]

Semantic evolution

The first sense, “to make something happen before its time, or before something else”, has stayed the main one.^[2][5] Nebrija (c. 1495) glosses it “to take first”, and gives anticiparse as “to go first, forestall”.^[13][14] Autoridades defines it as doing something before the usual or appointed time.^[15] Domínguez (1846) and Gaspar y Roig record the commercial sense of advancing or lending money before it is due, which the Academy took into its 1884 edition.^[16][17][18] Older senses “to prefer” and “to surpass” are now obsolete.^[5] The sense “to foresee, predict” is treated in Puerto Rico as a semantic loan from English to anticipate, and the DLE now gives it as “to guess what will happen”.^[19][5]

Timeline

• 1325 – Pedro de Cuéllar's Catecismo (in a copy of 1472).^[11]
• after 1350 – anteçiparlo in the translation of the Historia de Jerusalem abreviada.^[11]
• c. 1400 – Antiçipemos fazer paz in a Bible of the Escorial.^[2]
• 1444 – Juan de Mena, the first record in the DCECH and the BDELC.^[3][4]
• 1495 – the derivative anticipación.^[4]
• 1535 – first record in the Americas, at Santo Domingo.^[20]
• 1611 – Covarrubias defines it as doing a thing before its ordinary time.^[9]
• c. 1870 – the noun anticipo.^[4]
• 1884 – the Academy adds the sense of paying money in advance.^[18]

Meanings

Verb

1. (transitive) To make something happen before the appointed or expected time, or before something else; to bring forward: El club anticipó el partido al sábado.^[5][1]
2. (transitive) To pay money before the agreed date; to advance: La empresa le anticipó dos meses de salario.^[5]
3. (transitive) To announce something before a given moment or before the expected time.^[5]
4. (transitive) To guess what is going to happen; to foresee.^[5]
5. (transitive, obsolete) To prefer someone or something over others.^[5]
6. (transitive, obsolete) To surpass someone.^[5]
7. (reflexive) To act before someone else; to get ahead of them (adelantarse): Se anticipó a todos y compró las entradas.^[5][1]
8. (reflexive) To happen earlier than usual or than appointed: Este otoño se han anticipado las heladas.^[5][1]

Word family

• anticipación
• anticipo
• anticipado

Related words

• anticipatorio
• adelantar
• Latin anticipō
• English anticipate

Usage notes

Cuervo's dictionary of construction collects the uses with a (anticiparse a alguien) and the reflexive with a direct object, anticiparse la muerte.^[21]

References

1. ^ a b c d e f g h 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. anticipar
3. ^ a b c Corominas, Joan; Pascual, José A. (1980–1991), Diccionario crítico etimológico castellano e hispánico, 6 vols., Madrid: Gredos, p. 1, 278
4. ^ a b c d e Corominas, Joan (1973), Breve diccionario etimológico de la lengua castellana, 3rd ed., Madrid: Gredos, p. s.v. anticipar
5. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l 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. anticipar
6. ^ Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press, p. s.v. anticipo
7. ^ Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press, p. s.v. anticipo
8. ^ Bénaben, Michel (2000), Dictionnaire étymologique de l'espagnol, Paris: Ellipses, p. s.v. anticipar
9. ^ 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. 185
10. ^ Echegaray, Eduardo de (1887–1889), Diccionario general etimológico de la lengua española, 5 vols., Madrid: José María Faquineto, p. 356
11. ^ a b c d Real Academia Española (2013–), Corpus del Diccionario histórico de la lengua española (CDH), version 3.1, https://apps.rae.es/CNDHE, p. s.v. anticipar
12. ^ Diccionario del Español Medieval electrónico (DEMel), data publication 2026 (CC BY-SA), Universität Rostock, p. s.v. anticipar
13. ^ Nebrija, Antonio de (1513), Vocabulario español-latino, Salamanca, ed. Marina Vidal Díez (2007), Biblioteca Virtual Miguel de Cervantes, p. 293
14. ^ 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. anticipar
15. ^ Real Academia Española (1726–1739), Diccionario de la lengua castellana (Diccionario de Autoridades), 6 vols., Madrid: Francisco del Hierro, p. 1, 308
16. ^ Domínguez, Ramón Joaquín (1846–1847), Diccionario nacional o gran diccionario clásico de la lengua española, 2 vols., Madrid: Establecimiento Léxico-Tipográfico de R. J. Domínguez, p. 135
17. ^ 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, 173
18. ^ a b Real Academia Española (1884), Diccionario de la lengua castellana, 12th ed., Madrid: Imprenta de D. Gregorio Hernando (the first Academy edition with etymologies), p. 78
19. ^ Academia Puertorriqueña de la Lengua Española; Universidad de Puerto Rico, Tesoro lexicográfico del español de Puerto Rico, https://tesoro.pr, p. s.v. anticipar
20. ^ 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. antecipar
21. ^ 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, 492