apartamiento

Forms

apartamiento m (plural apartamientos)^[1] Old and classical texts also write appartamiento, apartamento and apartamyento.^[2]

Etymology

It is formed from Spanish apartar + -miento.^[1][2] The verb, properly “to put to one side”, comes from aparte and parte, which is from Latin pars (“part”).^[3][4]

In the 16th century Italian borrowed the word, in the sense “secluded place, apartment”, as Italian appartamento (1538, Paolo Giovio), adapted to appartare;^[5][6][1] Spanish then took the Italian word back as apartamento “flat”.^[7]

Earliest recorded meaning

Berceo's Del sacrificio de la misa (1236–1246, in an early 14th-century copy) has it for a withdrawal or separation: En el cuerpo del canon, en la quinta lectión, / de tal apartamiento fazemos mencïón “in the body of the canon, in the fifth reading, we make mention of such a separation”.^[2][8] The sense “a place set apart” follows in the Calila e Dimna (1251) and Berceo's Poema de Santa Oria.^[8][9]

Semantic evolution

Medieval texts use it for separation in many fields: the Libro de los doce sabios (c. 1237) calls temperance apartamiento de yra “the putting away of anger”, and a 13th-century Bible renders Latin anathema with it.^[2] Nebrija glossed it with Latin segregatio and separatio, and Percyvall (1591) with English “severing, departing, divorce”.^[10][11] The Diccionario de Autoridades adds the legal sense of withdrawing from an action and the separation of spouses.^[12]

The sense “room, dwelling” is in the Quijote (algún pequeño apartamiento de su alcázar), where Cejador compares French appartement.^[13] The Academy marked it as obsolete in 1843, together with “divorce” and “a secluded place”, and recorded the slang apartamiento de ganado “cattle theft”.^[14] Santamaría (1942) calls the sense “flat” a Gallicism of Spanish America; the Dominican Republic and Venezuela still use apartamiento for “apartment”.^[15][16]

Timeline

• 1236–1246 – Berceo's Del sacrificio de la misa uses it for a separation.^[2]
• 1251 – a secluded place, in the Calila e Dimna.^[8]
• 1513 – Nebrija glosses it with Latin segregatio and separatio.^[10]
• 1525 – the first record from the Americas, in Mexico City: devorçio e apartamiento of a marriage.^[17]
• 1538 – Italian borrows it as appartamento.^[5]
• 1548 – the compartments of a quince are apartamientos, in a text from Santo Domingo.^[17]
• 1615 – a room of a palace in the second part of the Quijote.^[13]
• 1726 – the Diccionario de Autoridades gives the legal sense and the separation of spouses.^[12]
• 1899 – the Academy's dictionary adds apartamiento de meridiano.^[18]

Meanings

Noun

1. The act of moving something or someone apart, or of withdrawing; separation: El apartamiento del grupo lo dejó muy solo.^[19][1]
2. A secluded or remote place.^[19]
3. A small cell or cavity in animals and plants.^[19]
4. (law) A formal withdrawal from an action or appeal one has brought.^[19][12]
5. (Spain, rare) A small flat (apartamento).^[19]
6. (rare) A flat or apartment; usual in this sense in the Dominican Republic and Venezuela.^[19][16]
7. (obsolete) A dwelling, rooms to live in.^[19]

Related words

• apartamento
• aparte
• parte
• Italian appartamento

Usage notes

In navigation, apartamiento de meridiano is the length of the arc of a parallel between two meridians, given in miles.^[19]

References

1. ^ a b c d e Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e 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. apartamiento
3. ^ Corominas, Joan (1973), Breve diccionario etimológico de la lengua castellana, 3rd ed., Madrid: Gredos, p. s.v. parte
4. ^ 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. apartamiento
5. ^ a b Cortelazzo, Manlio; Zolli, Paolo (1999), Dizionario etimologico della lingua italiana, 2nd ed. by Manlio Cortelazzo and Michele A. Cortelazzo, Bologna: Zanichelli
6. ^ Nocentini, Alberto; Parenti, Alessandro (2010), l'Etimologico: vocabolario della lingua italiana, Firenze: Le Monnier
7. ^ 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. apartamento
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. apartamiento
9. ^ Boggs, R. S.; Kasten, Lloyd; Keniston, Hayward; Richardson, H. B. (1946), Tentative Dictionary of Medieval Spanish, 2 vols., Chapel Hill, N.C., p. 41
10. ^ a b Nebrija, Antonio de (1513), Vocabulario español-latino, Salamanca, ed. Marina Vidal Díez (2007), Biblioteca Virtual Miguel de Cervantes, p. 294
11. ^ Percyvall, Richard (1591), Bibliothecae Hispanicae pars altera: containing a dictionarie in Spanish, English and Latine, London: John Jackson for Richard Watkins, p. s.v. apartamiento
12. ^ a b c Real Academia Española (1726–1739), Diccionario de la lengua castellana (Diccionario de Autoridades), 6 vols., Madrid: Francisco del Hierro, p. 1, 327
13. ^ a b Cejador y Frauca, Julio (1905–1906), La lengua de Cervantes: gramática y diccionario de la lengua castellana en El ingenioso hidalgo don Quijote de la Mancha, 2 vols., Madrid: Jaime Ratés, p. s.v. apartamiento
14. ^ Real Academia Española (1843), Diccionario de la lengua castellana, 9th ed., Madrid: Imprenta de D. Francisco María Fernández, p. 55
15. ^ Santamaría, Francisco J. (1942), Diccionario general de americanismos, 3 vols., México: Pedro Robredo, p. 112
16. ^ a b Asociación de Academias de la Lengua Española (2010), Diccionario de americanismos, Lima: Santillana; online at https://www.asale.org/damer, p. s.v. apartamiento
17. ^ a b 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. apartamiento
18. ^ Real Academia Española (1899), Diccionario de la lengua castellana, 13th ed., Madrid: Imprenta de los Sres. Hernando y Compañía, p. 76
19. ^ 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. apartamiento