armar

Forms

armar (first-person singular present armo, first-person singular preterite armé, past participle armado)^[1]

Etymology

It is inherited from Latin armāre (“to arm, equip”).^[2][3][4][1] The Latin verb is formed from arma (“arms, weapons”), whose Spanish descendant is arma.^[5][1][2]

The same Latin verb is Portuguese armar, Catalan armar, French armer, Italian armare and Romanian arma.^[6][7][8]

De Vaan derives the Latin noun from *armo- and Proto-Indo-European *h₂(e)r-mo- (“fitting”), from the root of Ancient Greek ἀραρίσκω (ararískō, “to fit together”).^[9] Covarrubias in 1611 collected the older guesses: from armi (“shoulders”), from which arms hang, from arcere (“to ward off”), as Varro had it, or from a Greek verb “to fit”.^[10]

Earliest recorded meaning

The first record is in the Cantar de mio Cid (c. 1140, known from a 14th-century copy): armado es mio Cid con cuantos que él ha “my Cid is armed, with all the men he has”.^{[11][2][3][12]} The Cid also has the reflexive, of Moors arming themselves for battle.^[12]

Semantic evolution

From “to put on arms” and “to provide with arms” the verb spread early to other kinds of fitting out.^[13][14] Alfonso X's astronomical books use it for assembling the parts of instruments and for setting one thing on another, and the Libro de buen amor for pitching a tent.^[13][14] Covarrubias in 1611 recorded fitting out ships against the Turks, from which the fleet is called armada, and setting traps for birds, rabbits and foxes.^[10] Autoridades added “to suit someone”, quoting Fray Luis de Granada.^[15]

The sense “to cause, start”, as in armar un baile or armarse una tempestad, was in the Academy's dictionary by 1817, and armarla, first “to cheat at cards”, later meant “to start a row”.^[16][17][4] In Latin America the reflexive means “to balk”, of a horse, and in several countries “to get rich”; in Argentina and Uruguay armar is to roll a cigarette, and in Argentina armar bien was said of clothes that fit.^[18][19][20] In the Canaries it once meant to accompany a drink with a snack.^[21]

Timeline

• c. 1140 – the Cantar de mio Cid uses armado and armarse.^[11][3]
• 1254–1260 – Alfonso X uses armar for assembling astronomical instruments.^[13]
• 1476 – first record of the derivative armada.^[3][2]
• 1518 – first record from the Americas, in Santo Domingo.^[22]
• 1591 – Percyvall glosses it “to arm, to prepare, to set a snare”.^[23]
• 1611 – Covarrubias records the naval sense and the trapping of game.^[10]
• 1817 – the Academy records armar un baile and armarse una tempestad.^[16]
• 1869 – the Academy defines it as fitting together the pieces of a piece of furniture or a machine.^[24]

Meanings

Verb

1. (transitive, also reflexive) To arm, to supply someone with weapons or with something used as a weapon: Se armaron con palos y piedras.^[4][1]
2. (transitive, also reflexive) To put someone's armour on them.^[4]
3. (transitive) To make a crossbow or bow ready to shoot; to fix the bayonet on a rifle.^[4]
4. (transitive) To assemble, to fit together the parts of something: armar una estantería.^[4][1]
5. (transitive) To set or base one thing on another.^[4]
6. (transitive) To shape a tree by leaving it one or more leaders.^[4]
7. (transitive, colloquial, also reflexive) To cause a commotion or a row, as in armar un escándalo.^[4][1]
8. (nautical) To fit out a ship.^[4]
9. (transitive, colloquial) To prepare or carry out a plan or trick.^[4]
10. (transitive) To set a trap for game.^[4]
11. (intransitive, mining) Of an ore, to lie among the rocks that contain it.^[4]
12. (intransitive, obsolete) To suit someone.^[4]
13. (reflexive) To summon up the courage or patience needed for something, as in armarse de valor.^[4][1]

Word family

• desarmar
• armada
• armado
• armador
• armadura
• armazón
• rearmar

Related words

• armamento
• arma
• armario
• inerme
• Latin armō
• Portuguese armar

Usage notes

Armar caballero is to knight someone.^[25] Colloquial armarla means to start a row or cause an upset.^[4]

References

1. ^ a b c d e f g h Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d Corominas, Joan; Pascual, José A. (1980–1991), Diccionario crítico etimológico castellano e hispánico, 6 vols., Madrid: Gredos, p. 1, 337
3. ^ a b c d Corominas, Joan (1973), Breve diccionario etimológico de la lengua castellana, 3rd ed., Madrid: Gredos, p. s.v. arma
4. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p 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. armar
5. ^ Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press, p. s.v. armō
6. ^ Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter, p. 651
7. ^ García de Diego, Vicente (1985), Diccionario etimológico español e hispánico, 2nd ed., Madrid: Espasa-Calpe (1st ed. 1954), p. art. 699
8. ^ Segura Munguía, Santiago (2001), Nuevo diccionario etimológico latín-español y de las voces derivadas, Bilbao: Universidad de Deusto, p. 57
9. ^ de Vaan, Michiel (2008), Etymological Dictionary of Latin and the other Italic Languages, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 7, Leiden; Boston: Brill
10. ^ a b c Covarrubias Orozco, Sebastián de (1611), Tesoro de la lengua castellana o española, Madrid: Luis Sánchez (Biblioteca Wordkers transcription, CC BY 4.0), p. 212
11. ^ 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. armar
12. ^ a b 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. 378
13. ^ a b c 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. armar
14. ^ a b Boggs, R. S.; Kasten, Lloyd; Keniston, Hayward; Richardson, H. B. (1946), Tentative Dictionary of Medieval Spanish, 2 vols., Chapel Hill, N.C., p. 49
15. ^ Real Academia Española (1726–1739), Diccionario de la lengua castellana (Diccionario de Autoridades), 6 vols., Madrid: Francisco del Hierro, p. 1, 393
16. ^ a b Real Academia Española (1817), Diccionario de la lengua castellana, 5th ed., Madrid: Imprenta Real, p. 86
17. ^ Real Academia Española (1843), Diccionario de la lengua castellana, 9th ed., Madrid: Imprenta de D. Francisco María Fernández, p. 64
18. ^ Santamaría, Francisco J. (1942), Diccionario general de americanismos, 3 vols., México: Pedro Robredo, p. 133
19. ^ Asociación de Academias de la Lengua Española (2010), Diccionario de americanismos, Lima: Santillana; online at https://www.asale.org/damer, p. s.v. armar
20. ^ Garzón, Tobías (1910), Diccionario argentino, Barcelona: Imprenta Elzeviriana de Borrás y Mestres, p. 33
21. ^ 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. armar
22. ^ 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. armar
23. ^ Percyvall, Richard (1591), Bibliothecae Hispanicae pars altera: containing a dictionarie in Spanish, English and Latine, London: John Jackson for Richard Watkins, p. 69
24. ^ Real Academia Española (1869), Diccionario de la lengua castellana, 11th ed., Madrid: Imprenta de Don Manuel Rivadeneyra, p. 69
25. ^ 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, 228