azufre

Forms

azufre m (uncountable)^[1] Old Spanish said sufre until the early 16th century.^[2] Corominas's first açufre is Fernández de Oviedo's of 1535, and an intermediate zufre appears in Juan de Vidós's Medicina.^[2][3] DEMel, however, already has acufre in the 13th-century Libro de los caballos.^[4] Aragonese has xufre, eixufre and ixufre.^[1][5]

Etymology

It is inherited from Old Spanish sufre, inherited from Latin sulphur (“sulphur, brimstone”).^[2][3][6][1] The Latin word is a Hellenised spelling of older sulpur.^[1][7]

Corominas explains the three ways in which the Spanish word differs from the Latin.^[2] Its /u/, unknown to the other Romance languages, is not a learned feature but the same influence that acted in dulce and surco.^[2] Its ⟨z⟩, which also appears in Italian zolfo and in Romansh and Italian dialect forms, may go back to Latin itself, as in zaborra; both words are thought to be dialectal or Etruscan in Latin.^[2][3] The initial ⟨a⟩ does not show that the word passed through Mozarabic or Arabic, since the Muslims of Spain called sulphur by another Arabic word, the source of alcrebite.^[2][8] It probably comes from a wrong division of the very common phrase piedra sufre (“sulphur stone”), helped by words such as azúcar.^{[2][3][9][10]}

The same Latin word is Portuguese enxofre, Galician xofre, Asturian sufre, Aragonese xufre, Catalan sofre, French soufre and solfo.^[5][11][1] Older Portuguese forms are Old Galician-Portuguese suffre, xufre and axufre.^[8][12]

The origin of the Latin word is uncertain.^[1][7] Wiktionary's Spanish entry gives Proto-Indo-European *swelplos from the root *swel- (“to burn, smoulder”).^[1] Its Latin entry links it rather with Proto-Germanic *sweblaz (“sulphur”) and allows for a blend of two roots or a non-Indo-European wandering word.^[1] The DHLF considers it a dialect word of unclear origin.^[1][7]

Earliest recorded meaning

The earliest record in the CDH is in La fazienda de Ultra Mar, dated c. 1200 and known from a 13th-century copy.^[13] Fire falls from heaven on Sodom with truenos e relanpagos e foldres e sufre, “thunder and lightning and thunderbolts and brimstone”.^[13] Corominas's first records are the Libro de Alexandre, whose infernal city has walls de sufre, “of sulphur”, and a 13th-century customs tariff.^[2][13] In Alfonso X's Lapidario sufre is the yellow mineral, hot and dry in nature.^[14]

Semantic evolution

The phrase piedra sufre was very common in Old Spanish, in the Libro de Alexandre, the customs tariffs, Alfonso de Palencia and Nebrija.^[2] In 1525 a Panamanian document still writes piedra çufre.^[15] In 1726 Autoridades notes that the old form was zufre, and explains sulphur as a mineral juice of the earth, with the expressions piedra azufre and tierra azufre.^[16] The Academy's dictionary of 1884 calls it a metaloide and gives the etymology from Latin sulphur.^[17] Today the DLE defines it as the chemical element of atomic number 16.^[6]

Spanish took its chemical vocabulary from the Latin form instead: sulfúreo from about 1440, then sulfúrico, from which sulfuro and the chemical suffix -uro were drawn, and sulfato, in the Academy's dictionary by 1884.^[2][3] Solfatara is from Italian, a derivative of solfo.^[2]

Timeline

• c. 1200 – sufre in La fazienda de Ultra Mar (in a 13th-century copy).^[13]
• 1240–1250 – sufre in the Libro de Alexandre (in a copy of the early 15th century).^[2][13]
• c. 1250 – Corominas's date for the first record.^[3]
• 1250–1279 – Alfonso X's Lapidario describes sufre.^[14]
• c. 1440 – first record of the learned adjective sulfúreo.^[2]
• 1513 – first record in the Americas, in Puerto Rico.^[15]
• 1535 – Fernández de Oviedo writes açufre.^[2]
• 1726 – Autoridades says the old form was zufre.^[16]
• 1884 – the Academy's dictionary gives the etymology and calls it a metaloide.^[17]

Meanings

Noun

1. sulphur: the chemical element of atomic number 16 (symbol S), brittle and yellow with a strong smell, found native or in sulphides and sulphates.^[6][1]

Word family

• azufrar

Related words

• sulfato
• sulfúrico
• sulfuro
• sulfúreo
• solfatara
• alcrebite

Usage notes

Set phrases are azufre vivo “native sulphur” and azufre vegetal, the yellow powder of clubmoss spores.^[6][18] The learned stem sulf- forms the chemical words: sulfato, sulfito, sulfuro, sulfúrico.^[18][19]

References

1. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o Corominas, Joan; Pascual, José A. (1980–1991), Diccionario crítico etimológico castellano e hispánico, 6 vols., Madrid: Gredos, p. 1, 438
3. ^ a b c d e f Corominas, Joan (1973), Breve diccionario etimológico de la lengua castellana, 3rd ed., Madrid: Gredos, p. s.v. azufre
4. ^ Diccionario del Español Medieval electrónico (DEMel), data publication 2026 (CC BY-SA), Universität Rostock, p. s.v. azufre
5. ^ a b García de Diego, Vicente (1985), Diccionario etimológico español e hispánico, 2nd ed., Madrid: Espasa-Calpe (1st ed. 1954), p. 6476
6. ^ a b c d 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. azufre
7. ^ a b c Rey, Alain, ed. (1992), Dictionnaire historique de la langue française, Paris: Le Robert, p. s.v. soufre
8. ^ a b Nascentes, Antenor (1966), Dicionário etimológico resumido, Rio de Janeiro: Instituto Nacional do Livro, p. s.v. enxofre
9. ^ Bénaben, Michel (2000), Dictionnaire étymologique de l'espagnol, Paris: Ellipses, p. s.v. azufre
10. ^ Houaiss, Antônio; Villar, Mauro de Salles (2001), Dicionário Houaiss da língua portuguesa, Rio de Janeiro: Objetiva, p. s.v. enxofre
11. ^ Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter
12. ^ Cunha, Antônio Geraldo da (2010), Dicionário etimológico da língua portuguesa, 4th ed., Rio de Janeiro: Lexikon, p. 1345
13. ^ 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. azufre
14. ^ 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. azufre
15. ^ 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. azufre
16. ^ a b Real Academia Española (1726–1739), Diccionario de la lengua castellana (Diccionario de Autoridades), 6 vols., Madrid: Francisco del Hierro, p. 1, 523
17. ^ 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. 127
18. ^ a b Moliner, María (2007), Diccionario de uso del español, 3rd ed., Madrid: Gredos
19. ^ Battaner Arias, Paz (dir.) (2017), Diccionario general de la lengua española VOX, Barcelona: Larousse Editorial