breve

Forms

breve m or f (masculine and feminine plural breves, superlative brevísimo)^[1] The Fueros de Aragón of 1247 have the Aragonese form breu.^[2]

Etymology

It is borrowed from Latin brevis (“short”).^[3][4][5][1] The word shows no popular development in Spanish, while Catalan breu, Occitan breu and Old French brief look inherited;^[3] Corominas thinks it was probably a semi-popular word everywhere, influenced by Latin, and that the everyday word was Latin curtus, whence corto.^[3] The same Latin word is Portuguese breve, Italian breve and French bref.^[6][1] The noun Medieval Latin breve “short writing, document” gave the Old French word the sense “letter” and the Italian one the sense “amulet”.^[6]

The Latin adjective goes back to Proto-Italic *breɣʷis and Proto-Indo-European *mréǵʰus.^[1] De Vaan explains it as an old u-stem adjective enlarged with *-i-, as in gravis and tenuis, and compares Ancient Greek βραχύς (brakhús, “short”), Sanskrit मुहु (múhu, “suddenly”) and Old High German murg “short”.^[7] The English merry is a cognate.^[1]

Earliest recorded meaning

Corominas dates the word to Berceo.^[3][4] In Berceo's Milagros de Nuestra Señora (1246–1252, known from an 18th-century copy) a short prayer pleases God: de la oración breve se suele Dios pagar.^[2] Herman the German's translation of the Psalter (c. 1240–1272) says posiste breues los míos días “you made my days short”.^[2]

Semantic evolution

In Old Spanish the adjective meant “of short duration” and, as an adverb, “in a short time”.^[8] A breve was a letter in 1491.^[3] Covarrubias in 1611 records the noun for a papal brief, and Autoridades explains that it was so called because it was issued without legal formalities.^[9][10] Autoridades also gives the senses “short in space”, “fleeting” (vida breve) and “concise”.^[11] Terreros records the musical note.^[12]

The Academy's 1884 edition calls a word with stress on the penultimate syllable breve in grammar and gives the old sense “letterhead”.^[13] Poets use it for “small”, as of a forehead or a foot.^[14][15] In journalism a breve is now a short news item.^[5] In Ecuador breve is an adverb for “quickly”.^[16] Baralt condemned breve for “in short” as a Gallicism.^[17]

Timeline

• 1220–1250 – Berceo, the first record Corominas gives.^[3][4]
• c. 1240–1272 – Herman the German's Psalter.^[2]
• 1247 – Aragonese breu in the Fueros de Aragón.^[2]
• 1254 – Alfonso X's Judizios de las estrellas speaks of short journeys.^[18]
• 1491 – breve “letter”.^[3]
• 1495 – the derivative brevedad.^[4]
• 1518 – the first record from the Americas, in Santo Domingo.^[19]
• 1611 – Covarrubias records the papal breve.^[9]
• 1726 – Autoridades explains the name of the papal brief.^[10]

Meanings

Adjective

1. brief, short in extent or duration: una visita breve.^[5][1]
2. (phonetics) Of a vowel or syllable: shorter than the long ones, in languages such as Latin or Greek that distinguish length.^[5]

Noun

1. (masculine) A papal brief, a document less solemn than a bula.^[5]
2. (masculine) A short text printed in a column or block with others like it.^[5]
3. (masculine, obsolete) A letterhead.^[5]
4. (feminine, music) A breve, an old note worth two whole notes.^[5][1]

Word family

• brevedad

Related words

• abreviar
• breviario
• corto
• Latin brevis
• English brief

Usage notes

En breve means “shortly, soon”.^[5]

References

1. ^ a b c d e f g h Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ 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. breve
3. ^ 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, 662
4. ^ a b c d Corominas, Joan (1973), Breve diccionario etimológico de la lengua castellana, 3rd ed., Madrid: Gredos, p. s.v. breve
5. ^ 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. breve
6. ^ a b Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter, p. 1291
7. ^ de Vaan, Michiel (2008), Etymological Dictionary of Latin and the other Italic Languages, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 7, Leiden; Boston: Brill
8. ^ Boggs, R. S.; Kasten, Lloyd; Keniston, Hayward; Richardson, H. B. (1946), Tentative Dictionary of Medieval Spanish, 2 vols., Chapel Hill, N.C., p. 83
9. ^ 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. 341
10. ^ a b Real Academia Española (1726–1739), Diccionario de la lengua castellana (Diccionario de Autoridades), 6 vols., Madrid: Francisco del Hierro, p. 1, 680
11. ^ Real Academia Española (1726–1739), Diccionario de la lengua castellana (Diccionario de Autoridades), 6 vols., Madrid: Francisco del Hierro, p. s.v. breve
12. ^ Terreros y Pando, Esteban de (1786–1793), Diccionario castellano con las voces de ciencias y artes y sus correspondientes de las tres lenguas francesa, latina e italiana, 4 vols., Madrid: Viuda de Ibarra, p. 1, 272
13. ^ Real Academia Española (1884), Diccionario de la lengua castellana, 12th ed., Madrid: Imprenta de D. Gregorio Hernando (the first Academy edition with etymologies), p. 168
14. ^ Cuervo, Rufino José (1886–1893), Diccionario de construcción y régimen de la lengua castellana, vols. I–II (A–D), París: A. Roger y F. Chernoviz, p. 1, 900
15. ^ Moliner, María (2007), Diccionario de uso del español, 3rd ed., Madrid: Gredos, p. s.v. breve
16. ^ Asociación de Academias de la Lengua Española (2010), Diccionario de americanismos, Lima: Santillana; online at https://www.asale.org/damer, p. s.v. breve
17. ^ Baralt, Rafael María (1855), Diccionario de galicismos, Madrid: Imprenta de J. Cruzado, p. 128
18. ^ 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. breve
19. ^ 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. breve