autorizar

Forms

autorizar (first-person singular present autorizo, first-person singular preterite autoricé, past participle autorizado)^[1] Old Spanish wrote abtorizar, actorizar and auctorizar beside autorizar; the DCECH calls abtoryzar in the Cancionero de Baena a hypercorrect spelling.^[2][3]

Etymology

It is borrowed from Medieval Latin auctorizo (“to authorize, confirm”), a legal word of medieval Latin.^[1][4][5] Bénaben explains it as a derivative of auctor in the legal sense “guarantor”.^[5] Niermeyer records the Medieval Latin verb in the senses “to authorize, confirm” and “to warrant as guarantor”.^[6] Wiktionary analyses it as the noun's stem with the verb suffix -izō, and dates its first record to 838.^[1]

The DLE and Moliner give the origin only as autor, and the DCECH and the BDELC list the verb among the derivatives of that noun.^[7][8][2][9] The Latin noun is formed on augeō (“to increase”) with the agent suffix -tor.^[2][10][1]

The same Medieval Latin verb was taken into Portuguese autorizar, Catalan autoritzar and French autoriser.^[11][12][1] By regular sound change it gave Old French otreier “to grant, consent”, the ancestor of French octroyer.^[13][1] The inherited Spanish verb of the same root is otorgar, which the DCECH traces to Vulgar Latin *auctoricare.^[2]

Earliest recorded meaning

The CDH's earliest Castilian example is a document of 1348 about the convent of the Poor Clares, asking that someone quisiese abtorizar los dichos palaçios e lugar para monesterio “would authorize the said palaces and place as a convent”.^[3] The DCECH, without that text, dates the verb to the early 15th century, with abtoryzar in the Cancionero de Baena, and the spelling autorizar to about 1490, in Hernando del Pulgar's chronicle of the Catholic Monarchs.^[2] The BDELC gives the early 15th century.^[9]

Semantic evolution

In the 15th century the verb meant both “to give authority to” and “to support with the authority of an author or a witness”: Alfonso de Cartagena's translation of Cicero (1422) and Pulgar's chronicle use it so.^[3][14] Nebrija rendered it in Latin as “to confirm by authority”.^[15][16]

Covarrubias in 1611 described a man of credit approving something and a notary authorizing a deed by signing it and attesting its legality.^[17] The Diccionario de Autoridades put this notarial sense first, and added “to make something worthy of esteem” and “to enhance an action, lend it lustre”.^[18][19] In the Americas, a letter from Cartagena of 1537 already praises a house that autoriza y honra mucho esta dicha ciudad “greatly adorns and honours this city”.^[20] The Academy's 1770 dictionary opened the entry with “to give someone authority or power to do something”, the order the DLE keeps today, where “to permit” is now a sense of its own.^[21][7]

In 1855 Baralt objected to autorizar a + infinitive as a French construction and wanted autorizar para;^[22] Moliner and the DLE now accept both prepositions.^[22][8]

Timeline

• 1084 – the Latin form auctoriza appears in a charter of León and Castile, followed by auctorizo in the Fuero of Calatayud of 1162.^[23]
• 1348 – first Castilian example, spelt abtorizar, in the CDH.^[3]
• 1422 – Alfonso de Cartagena's translation of Cicero's De officiis uses autorizandolo.^[3]
• Early 15th century – abtoryzar in the Cancionero de Baena, the DCECH's first record.^[2]
• c. 1490 – the spelling autorizar in Pulgar's chronicle.^[2]
• c. 1495 – Nebrija gives the Latin equivalent auctoritate confirmo.^[15][16]
• 1537 – first record from the Americas, at Cartagena.^[20]
• 1611 – Covarrubias describes the notary who authorizes a deed by signing it.^[17]
• 1705 – first record of the derivative autorización.^[9]
• 1726 – the Diccionario de Autoridades defines the notarial and figurative senses.^[18]
• 1884 – the Academy's dictionary gives the etymology “from autor”.^[24]

Meanings

Verb

1. To authorize: to give or recognize someone's power or right to do something: El director la autorizó a firmar en su nombre.^[7][8][1]
2. (law) Of a notary or clerk: to attest a document, certifying it.^[7][18]
3. To support something with the authority of a text or of an author's opinion.^[7]
4. To approve or endorse.^[7]
5. To permit (permitir) or allow: El ayuntamiento no autorizó la obra.^[7][8]
6. To lend importance or lustre to someone or something.^[7][18]

Word family

• autorización
• desautorizar

Related words

• autor
• autoridad
• otorgar
• Latin auctor
• French autoriser

Usage notes

The verb takes a or para before an infinitive: lo autorizaron a salir, autorizado para firmar.^[8] Baralt in 1855 condemned the construction with a as French.^[22]

References

1. ^ a b c d e f g h 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, 416
3. ^ a b c d e Real Academia Española (2013–), Corpus del Diccionario histórico de la lengua española (CDH), version 3.1, https://apps.rae.es/CNDHE, p. s.v. autorizar
4. ^ Gómez de Silva, Guido (1988), Breve diccionario etimológico de la lengua española, México: Fondo de Cultura Económica / El Colegio de México, p. 101
5. ^ a b Bénaben, Michel (2000), Dictionnaire étymologique de l'espagnol, Paris: Ellipses, p. s.v. autorizar
6. ^ Niermeyer, J. F. (1976), Mediae Latinitatis Lexicon Minus, Leiden: Brill, p. s.v. auctorizare
7. ^ 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. autorizar
8. ^ a b c d e Moliner, María (2007), Diccionario de uso del español, 3rd ed., Madrid: Gredos, p. s.v. autorizar
9. ^ a b c Corominas, Joan (1973), Breve diccionario etimológico de la lengua castellana, 3rd ed., Madrid: Gredos, p. s.v. autor
10. ^ Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press, p. s.v. auctor
11. ^ Machado, José Pedro (1987), Dicionário etimológico da língua portuguesa, 4th ed., 5 vols., Lisboa: Livros Horizonte, p. 351
12. ^ Alcover, Antoni M.; Moll, Francesc de B. (1930–1962), Diccionari català-valencià-balear, 10 vols., Palma de Mallorca: Moll, p. s.v. autoritzar
13. ^ Rey, Alain, ed. (1992), Dictionnaire historique de la langue française, Paris: Le Robert, p. s.v. octroyer
14. ^ 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. 451
15. ^ a b Nebrija, Antonio de (1513), Vocabulario español-latino, Salamanca, ed. Marina Vidal Díez (2007), Biblioteca Virtual Miguel de Cervantes, p. 299
16. ^ a b 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. autorizar
17. ^ 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. 248
18. ^ a b c d Real Academia Española (1726–1739), Diccionario de la lengua castellana (Diccionario de Autoridades), 6 vols., Madrid: Francisco del Hierro, p. 1, 490
19. ^ Real Academia Española (1726–1739), Diccionario de la lengua castellana (Diccionario de Autoridades), 6 vols., Madrid: Francisco del Hierro, p. s.v. autorizar
20. ^ 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. autorizar
21. ^ Real Academia Española (1770), Diccionario de la lengua castellana, 2nd ed., vol. I: A–B, Madrid: Joachín Ibarra, p. 1, 397
22. ^ a b c Baralt, Rafael María (1855), Diccionario de galicismos, Madrid: Imprenta de J. Cruzado, p. 108
23. ^ Diccionario del Español Medieval electrónico (DEMel), data publication 2026 (CC BY-SA), Universität Rostock, p. s.v. autorizar
24. ^ Real Academia Española (1884), Diccionario de la lengua castellana, 12th ed., Madrid: Imprenta de D. Gregorio Hernando (the first Academy edition with etymologies), p. 121