azafrán

Forms

azafrán m (plural azafranes)^[1] Old Spanish wrote it mostly açafran, with azafran, çafran and zafran beside it.^[2] Aragonese had azafrán, zafrán and çafran, and Navarrese safrana.^[3]

Etymology

It is inherited from Old Spanish açafran, borrowed from Andalusian Arabic الزعفران (azzaʕfarán), from Arabic زعفران (zaʕfarān, “saffron”).^{[4][3][1][5][6]} The Andalusian form has the agglutinated Arabic article, assimilated to the following consonant.^[7] DICCA-XV derives the Arabic word from the Arabic for “yellow”.^[8]

The same Arabism is Portuguese açafrão, Galician azafrán and Catalan safrà (1271); according to Corominas, French safran was taken from this Catalan form, while Corriente takes Italian zafferano and Sicilian zafarana directly from Arabic.^[5][3]

In Old Spanish, as in Portuguese and Catalan, the first consonant was the voiceless affricate written ⟨ç⟩, although Arabic has a voiced /z/.^[5] Corominas explains it by the rarity of a voiced affricate at the start of a Romance word, and compares celo, from Latin zēlus, and azufaifa.^[5] He therefore rejects Neuvonen's view that the Spanish word comes from Medieval Latin safranum, which he takes to be a Latinisation of the Peninsular Arabism.^[5] That the word is not found in Romance before the 13th century proves nothing, since saffron was already grown in southern Spain in the 10th century.^[5]

Earliest recorded meaning

The CDH's first hit is the Semejanza del mundo, dated c. 1223 but read in a later manuscript (BNM 3369), of a stone that gives off a juice yellow como de açafran “as of saffron”.^[9] Corominas dates the word from Alfonso X's Libros del saber de astronomía (from 1256) and other 13th-century texts, such as the customs tariffs.^[5] In 1251 and 1253 royal privileges for Seville exempt the pound of silk e del açafrán e de todas las espeçias “and of saffron and of all the spices” from a tax.^[9]

Semantic evolution

In Old Spanish the word named both the plant and its stigmas, used to season food, to dye yellow and in medicine.^[10] Alfonso X's Lapidario compares the colour of stones to that of saffron, and names a piedra çafranera.^[11] Nebrija (c. 1495) distinguishes açafran la especia “the spice” (Latin crocum) from açafran la mesma flor “the flower itself” (crocus).^[8]

Later senses include the painters' orange-yellow colour made from the stigmas and a timber of a ship's rudder.^[12][4] García de Diego derives the nautical sense from a separate Arabic word zafrán “rudder”, with Portuguese açafrão in the same sense.^[13] Plant names include azafrán bastardo “safflower” and azafrán romín, which a price regulation of 1680 already mentions;^[14][15] azafrán de Marte was the old pharmacists' name for iron oxide.^[4][14][15] In the Americas the word names local plants: a shrub of the Dominican Republic and Puerto Rico, and a plant of northern Mexico used to dye noodles and butter yellow.^[16][17] In the Philippines it means turmeric, and Tagalog borrowed it as asapran.^[1]

Timeline

• c. 1223 – the Semejanza del mundo, known from a later manuscript, has açafran, the first hit in the CDH.^[9]
• 1250 – the Moamín, in a copy of the second half of the 13th century, prescribes saffron and ginger for hawks.^[9]
• 1251 – a privilege of Alfonso X for Seville names saffron among the spices.^[9]
• 1256 – the Libros del saber de astronomía, the DCECH's first record.^[5]
• 1475 – Guillén de Segovia records the verb azafranar.^[5]
• c. 1495 – Nebrija gives açafran for Latin crocum and crocus.^[8]
• 1512 – first record in the Americas, half a pound of saffron in Puerto Rico.^[18]
• 1680 – a price regulation sets the price of azafrán romín.^[14]

Meanings

Noun

1. The saffron crocus (Crocus sativus), a plant of the iris family (iridáceas) with a tuberous rhizome, narrow leaves and an orange-red stigma divided into three; it comes from the East and is grown in several provinces of Spain.^[4][1]
2. The dried stigmas of this flower, used as a seasoning (condimento) and in medicine: Echa unas hebras de azafrán al arroz.^[4][1]
3. (nautical) The outer timber of a ship's rudder (timón) blade, bolted to the main piece.^[4]
4. (also as a noun) Of a colour: orange-red, like that obtained from saffron.^[4][1]
5. (adjective, invariable) Saffron-coloured: unas cortinas azafrán.^[4][19]
6. (Dominican Republic, Puerto Rico) A shrub up to 6 metres tall with elliptic leaves and an inedible whitish fruit (Hedyosmum arborescens).^[16][20]
7. (Philippines) turmeric (Curcuma longa).^[1]

Word family

• azafranado
• azafranar

Related words

• Portuguese açafrão
• Catalan safrà
• Italian zafferano
• French safran

Usage notes

Set phrases include azafrán bastardo, another name of the safflower (alazor), and azafrán de Marte, iron oxide in old pharmacy.^[4][15]

References

1. ^ a b c d e f g h Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ Diccionario del Español Medieval electrónico (DEMel), data publication 2026 (CC BY-SA), Universität Rostock, p. s.v. azafrán
3. ^ a b c Corriente, Federico; Pereira, Christophe; Vicente, Ángeles (2019), Dictionnaire des emprunts ibéro-romans: emprunts à l'arabe et aux langues du monde islamique (Encyclopédie linguistique d'Al-Andalus 3), Berlin: De Gruyter, p. s.v. açafrão
4. ^ a b c d e f g h i 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. azafrán
5. ^ a b c d e f g h i Corominas, Joan; Pascual, José A. (1980–1991), Diccionario crítico etimológico castellano e hispánico, 6 vols., Madrid: Gredos, p. 1, 430
6. ^ Eguílaz y Yanguas, Leopoldo de (1886), Glosario etimológico de las palabras españolas (castellanas, catalanas, gallegas, mallorquinas, portuguesas, valencianas y bascongadas) de origen oriental, Granada: La Lealtad, p. 341
7. ^ Gómez de Silva, Guido (1988), Breve diccionario etimológico de la lengua española, México: Fondo de Cultura Económica / El Colegio de México
8. ^ a b c 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. azafrán
9. ^ 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. azafrán
10. ^ 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. 473
11. ^ 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. azafrán
12. ^ Real Academia Española (2001), Diccionario de la lengua española, 22nd ed., Madrid: Espasa-Calpe, p. s.v. azafrán
13. ^ García de Diego, Vicente (1985), Diccionario etimológico español e hispánico, 2nd ed., Madrid: Espasa-Calpe (1st ed. 1954), p. 7359
14. ^ a b c Real Academia Española (1726–1739), Diccionario de la lengua castellana (Diccionario de Autoridades), 6 vols., Madrid: Francisco del Hierro, p. s.v. azafrán
15. ^ a b c Moliner, María (2007), Diccionario de uso del español, 3rd ed., Madrid: Gredos, p. s.v. azafrán
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. azafrán
17. ^ Santamaría, Francisco J. (1959), Diccionario de mejicanismos, México: Porrúa, p. 103
18. ^ 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. azafrán
19. ^ Battaner Arias, Paz (dir.) (2017), Diccionario general de la lengua española VOX, Barcelona: Larousse Editorial, p. s.v. azafrán
20. ^ Academia Dominicana de la Lengua; Instituto Guzmán Ariza de Lexicografía (2024), Diccionario del español dominicano, 2nd ed., online at https://ded.igalex.org, p. s.v. azafrán