austeridad

Forms

austeridad f (plural austeridades)^[1]

Etymology

It is borrowed from Latin austēritās (“sourness, harshness; severity”), a learned word.^[2][1][3] The Latin noun is formed from austērus (“sour; severe”) with the suffix -tās.^[1][4] The adjective was taken from Ancient Greek αὐστηρός (austērós, “harsh, bitter”), which the Greek dictionaries relate to αὖος (aûos, “dry”).^[4][5][1] Spanish austero is the same Latin adjective.^[6]

The early texts have forms in ⟨-dat⟩, austeridat and absteridat, and the modern spelling appears in 1499.^[7] The same Latin noun is Catalan austeritat, French austérité and Italian austerità.^[8]

Earliest recorded meaning

The first record is in Enrique de Villena's translation of the Aeneid with his glosses (1427–1428, in a copy of 1442), with the spelling absteridat: a life of such great hardship that it could not be borne.^[7] The Spanish translation of Eiximenis's Libro de las donas (before 1448) uses austeridat for harsh rule over subjects.^[7] Corominas dates the word only to 1607.^[6]

Semantic evolution

Autoridades in 1726 noted that the Latin sense, the sourness of unripe fruit, was not used in Spanish; the word meant harshness and rigour of character, and figuratively penance and mortification.^[9] The Academy's dictionaries of the 19th century give the quality of being austere, the mortification of the senses and passions, and figuratively severity.^[10][11] Today the word also means sobriety and plainness, of a way of life or of a building.^[12] The Spanish Wiktionary records the recent economic sense, a policy of cutting public spending in a crisis, taken from English austerity and not yet in the Academy's dictionary.^[13]

Timeline

• 1427–1428 – Enrique de Villena writes absteridat.^[7]
• before 1448 – the translation of the Libro de las donas has austeridat.^[7]
• 1499 – Fernández de Santaella's Vocabulario eclesiástico has the modern form austeridad.^[7]
• 1607 – the first date Corominas gives.^[6]
• 1619 – first record from the Americas, in Buenos Aires.^[14]
• 1726 – Autoridades defines it as harshness of character, and as penance.^[9]

Meanings

Noun

1. austerity: the quality of being austero; severity, sobriety (sobriedad): Vivía con gran austeridad.^[2][12][1]
2. Mortification (mortificación) of the senses and passions.^[2]
3. (economics) A policy of cutting public spending.^[13]

Related words

• austero
• Latin austēritās
• French austérité

References

1. ^ a b c d e f Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c 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. austeridad
3. ^ Segura Munguía, Santiago (2001), Nuevo diccionario etimológico latín-español y de las voces derivadas, Bilbao: Universidad de Deusto
4. ^ a b Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
5. ^ Liddell, Henry George; Scott, Robert; Jones, Henry Stuart (1940), A Greek-English Lexicon, 9th ed., Oxford: Clarendon Press
6. ^ a b c Corominas, Joan (1973), Breve diccionario etimológico de la lengua castellana, 3rd ed., Madrid: Gredos, p. s.v. austero
7. ^ a b c d e f Real Academia Española (2013–), Corpus del Diccionario histórico de la lengua española (CDH), version 3.1, https://apps.rae.es/CNDHE, p. s.v. austeridad
8. ^ Echegaray, Eduardo de (1887–1889), Diccionario general etimológico de la lengua española, 5 vols., Madrid: José María Faquineto, p. 555
9. ^ a b Real Academia Española (1726–1739), Diccionario de la lengua castellana (Diccionario de Autoridades), 6 vols., Madrid: Francisco del Hierro, p. 1, 488
10. ^ Real Academia Española (1817), Diccionario de la lengua castellana, 5th ed., Madrid: Imprenta Real, p. 106
11. ^ Real Academia Española (1843), Diccionario de la lengua castellana, 9th ed., Madrid: Imprenta de D. Francisco María Fernández, p. 80
12. ^ a b Battaner Arias, Paz (dir.) (2017), Diccionario general de la lengua española VOX, Barcelona: Larousse Editorial, p. s.v. austeridad
13. ^ a b Wikcionario (Spanish Wiktionary), es.wiktionary.org
14. ^ 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. austeridad