atar

Forms

atar (first-person singular present ato, first-person singular preterite até, past participle atado)^[1]

Etymology

It is inherited from Old Spanish atar, inherited from Latin aptō (“to fit, fasten”).^[2][3][4][1] Among the Romance languages only Portuguese and Spanish kept the verb: the same word is Portuguese atar and Galician atar;^[2][5][6] the only trace east of them is deixatar (“to dissolve”) in Catalan, from a compound of the same verb.^[2][5][6] Wiktionary names aptar, a later learned borrowing, as its doublet.^[1]

The Latin verb is formed from aptus (“fastened; fit, suitable”), the participle of apīscor (“to seize, get”).^[2][3][7] De Vaan traces that verb to Proto-Indo-European *h₁ep- (“to take, grab”), with cognates in Hittite and Sanskrit.^[7]

Earliest recorded meaning

Corominas first finds the verb in Berceo, in the first half of the 13th century.^[2][3] In the Loores de Nuestra Señora the persecutors have a martyr's feet and hands tied before throwing him into the fire: Fiçieronli los piedes e las manos atar.^[8][9] The Fuero de Madrid, in a copy of the first half of the 13th century, orders a cow or bull brought into the town to be led atada con II sogas, tied with two ropes.^[10]

Semantic evolution

The physical sense “to tie with a rope or knot” has been central since Old Spanish, and Alfonso X's Lapidario uses it of a stone tied to a woman's thigh in childbirth.^[11][8] Covarrubias in 1611 derived it from Latin apto but also offered Greek and Hebrew sources, and recorded the proverbs quien bien ata, bien desata and ni ata ni desata (said of someone who talks without sense), the phrase al atar de los trapos “at the end, when the accounts are settled”, and atado for a person who is good for little.^[12] The Diccionario de Autoridades (1726) defined the verb as tying with cords and added a figurative sense, of joining one argument with another; it preferred the Hebrew etymology.^[13]

The Academy's 1884 edition gives the etymology from Latin aptare and the figurative senses still in the DLE: to hinder movement, to get stuck in an affair, to restrict oneself to a subject.^[14][4] Moliner records the phrases atar corto “to keep on a short leash” and no atar ni desatar “to settle nothing”.^[15] In Honduras and Nicaragua atar a mecate corto means to give someone little freedom.^[16]

Timeline

• 1200–1250 – the Fuero de Madrid, in a copy of this period, has atada “tied”.^[10]
• c. 1230–1264 – Berceo's Loores de Nuestra Señora uses atar of binding a martyr.^[8][2]
• 1250–1279 – Alfonso X's Lapidario uses the verb of tying a stone to the body.^[11]
• 1256–1276 – the derivative atadura appears in the Libros del saber de astronomía.^[2]
• 1513 – Nebrija gives Latin ligo and vincio as equivalents.^[17]
• 1611 – Covarrubias records quien bien ata, bien desata.^[12]
• 1726 – the Diccionario de Autoridades defines the verb and gives a figurative sense.^[13]
• 1884 – the Academy's dictionary gives the etymology from Latin aptare.^[14]

Meanings

Verb

1. To tie, fasten or join with a cord or knots: Ató la barca al muelle.^[4][1]
2. To stop or prevent movement; to constrain.^[4][1]
3. To join, connect or reconcile.^[4][15]
4. (pronominal) Not to know how to get out of an affair or difficulty.^[4]
5. (pronominal) To keep or restrict oneself to a particular subject.^[4]

Word family

• atado
• atadura
• desatar
• reatar
• atadero

Related words

• apto
• aptar
• Latin aptō
• Portuguese atar

Usage notes

Common phrases are atar corto “to keep someone on a short leash”, atar cabos “to put two and two together” and no atar ni desatar “to settle nothing”.^[15][12]

References

1. ^ a b c d e f Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g Corominas, Joan; Pascual, José A. (1980–1991), Diccionario crítico etimológico castellano e hispánico, 6 vols., Madrid: Gredos, p. 1, 389
3. ^ a b c Corominas, Joan (1973), Breve diccionario etimológico de la lengua castellana, 3rd ed., Madrid: Gredos, p. s.v. atar
4. ^ a b c d e f g 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. atar
5. ^ a b García de Diego, Vicente (1985), Diccionario etimológico español e hispánico, 2nd ed., Madrid: Espasa-Calpe (1st ed. 1954), p. art. 617
6. ^ a b Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter, p. s.v. aptāre
7. ^ 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, p. s.v. apīscor
8. ^ a b c 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. 432
9. ^ Boggs, R. S.; Kasten, Lloyd; Keniston, Hayward; Richardson, H. B. (1946), Tentative Dictionary of Medieval Spanish, 2 vols., Chapel Hill, N.C., p. 58
10. ^ 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. atar
11. ^ a b 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. atar
12. ^ 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. 237
13. ^ a b Real Academia Española (1726–1739), Diccionario de la lengua castellana (Diccionario de Autoridades), 6 vols., Madrid: Francisco del Hierro, p. 1, 459
14. ^ 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. 114
15. ^ a b c Moliner, María (2007), Diccionario de uso del español, 3rd ed., Madrid: Gredos, p. s.v. atar
16. ^ Asociación de Academias de la Lengua Española (2010), Diccionario de americanismos, Lima: Santillana; online at https://www.asale.org/damer, p. s.v. atar
17. ^ Nebrija, Antonio de (1513), Vocabulario español-latino, Salamanca, ed. Marina Vidal Díez (2007), Biblioteca Virtual Miguel de Cervantes, p. 298