Etymologically
Log in

caminar

History Permalink

Etymology and origin of the Spanish word caminar

Confidence
Established
Formation
Derivation
First attested
c. 1200 La fazienda de Ultra Mar, in a 13th-century copy More words from the 12th century
Ultimate origin
Vulgar Latin camminus
Etymology tree
inherited borrowed derived
Spanish camino
Spanish caminar

Pronunciation

  • /kamiˈnaɾ/, [ka.miˈnaɾ][1]

Forms

caminar (first-person singular present camino, first-person singular preterite caminé, past participle caminado)[1]

Etymology

It is formed from Spanish camino + -ar.[2][3][4] Wiktionary instead treats it as inherited from Vulgar Latin *cammīnāre, the Romance verb behind French cheminer and Italian camminare.[1] The same verb is Portuguese caminhar, Galician camiñar, Asturian caminar, Aragonese caminar, Catalan caminar and Occitan caminar.[1][5][6]

The noun camino continues Vulgar Latin camminus (“road, way”), which is first recorded in Spain in the 7th century and survives in every Romance language except Romanian.[2] Corominas and the REW take it from Celtic, comparing Old Irish céimm and Welsh cam (“step”).[2][7] Wiktionary calls the source Gaulish.[1]

Earliest recorded meaning

The CDH's earliest hit is in La fazienda de Ultra Mar, dated about 1200 and known from a 13th-century copy: Caminaronse dent a otro otero “they went from there to another hill”.[8][9] Corominas dates it to Berceo (1220–1250), who writes of a shepherd who caminaba a la tarde con ellas a posada “went home with them [the sheep] in the evening”.[2][3][10][11] In Old Spanish its main sense was “to travel, be on one's way”.[10]

Semantic evolution

The sense “to walk” is recorded from the 15th century, beside the older “to travel”.[10] Nebrija glossed it as andar camino, “to go one's way”, with Latin iter facere.[12] The Diccionario de Autoridades defined it as making a journey from one place to another, on foot, on horseback, by cart or by boat, and also used it of things that move by themselves: rivers, the sun, time.[13] From 1869 the Academy recorded the transitive use for the distance covered (hoy he caminado cinco leguas), and caminar derecho “to act honestly” was in its dictionary by 1817.[14][15]

In the Americas the first record is from Mexico in 1532.[16] Several American countries use the verb for a machine, business or campaign that works or makes progress, and the DAMER records many local senses, among them “to court someone” in Colombia and “to trick someone” in Argentina.[17] In Dominican baseball it means to walk a batter.[18] In Asturian caminar also means “to work, run” of an engine and “to get on” of people.[6]

Timeline

  • c. 1200 – Caminaronse in La fazienda de Ultra Mar (in a 13th-century copy).[8]
  • 1220–1250 – Berceo uses the verb;[3][10] Corominas's first record.[3][10]
  • c. 1400 – a Latin–Spanish glossary gives caminar for Latin itinero.[10]
  • c. 1495 – Nebrija: Caminar andar camino. facio iter.[12]
  • 1532 – first record in the Americas, in Mexico.[16]
  • 1715 – first record of caminata, borrowed from Italian.[3]
  • 1726–1739 – the Diccionario de Autoridades defines it as travelling from one place to another.[13]
  • 1869 – the Academy records the transitive use for the distance covered.[14]

Meanings

Verb

  1. (intransitive) To walk: to go on foot from one place to another, of a person or an animal: Caminamos hasta la plaza.[4][1]
  2. (intransitive) To travel, be on a journey.[4][1]
  3. (transitive) To walk a given distance: Ayer caminé ocho kilómetros.[4]
  4. (intransitive) Of an inanimate thing: to follow its course, as a river or a planet does.[4][19]
  5. (intransitive) To head towards a place or goal, to advance.[4][19]
  6. (intransitive, Caribbean, Venezuela, Ecuador, Peru) Of a machine or a business: to work, to run.[17]

Noun

  1. el caminar: a way of walking, gait.[4]

Word family

  • caminante
  • caminador
  • encaminar
  • descaminar

Usage notes

Caminar derecho is a colloquial phrase for “to behave honestly”.[4]

References

  1. ^ a b c d e f g Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
  2. ^ a b c d Corominas, Joan; Pascual, José A. (1980–1991), Diccionario crítico etimológico castellano e hispánico, 6 vols., Madrid: Gredos, p. 1, 787
  3. ^ a b c d e Corominas, Joan (1973), Breve diccionario etimológico de la lengua castellana, 3rd ed., Madrid: Gredos, p. s.v. camino
  4. ^ 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. caminar
  5. ^ Alcover, Antoni M.; Moll, Francesc de B. (1930–1962), Diccionari català-valencià-balear, 10 vols., Palma de Mallorca: Moll, p. s.v. caminar
  6. ^ a b Academia de la Llingua Asturiana (2000), Diccionariu de la Llingua Asturiana, Uviéu: ALLA; online at https://mas.academiadelallingua.com/diccionariu, p. s.v. caminar
  7. ^ Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter, p. s.v. camminus
  8. ^ a b Real Academia Española (2013–), Corpus del Diccionario histórico de la lengua española (CDH), version 3.1, https://apps.rae.es/CNDHE, p. s.v. caminar
  9. ^ Diccionario del Español Medieval electrónico (DEMel), data publication 2026 (CC BY-SA), Universität Rostock, p. s.v. caminar
  10. ^ a b c d e f 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. 598
  11. ^ Lanchetas, Rufino (1900), Gramática y vocabulario de las obras de Gonzalo de Berceo, Madrid: Sucesores de Rivadeneyra, p. 205
  12. ^ a b Nebrija, Antonio de (1513), Vocabulario español-latino, Salamanca, ed. Marina Vidal Díez (2007), Biblioteca Virtual Miguel de Cervantes, p. 309
  13. ^ a b Real Academia Española (1726–1739), Diccionario de la lengua castellana (Diccionario de Autoridades), 6 vols., Madrid: Francisco del Hierro, p. 2, 91
  14. ^ a b Real Academia Española (1869), Diccionario de la lengua castellana, 11th ed., Madrid: Imprenta de Don Manuel Rivadeneyra, p. 139
  15. ^ Real Academia Española (1817), Diccionario de la lengua castellana, 5th ed., Madrid: Imprenta Real, p. 164
  16. ^ 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. caminar
  17. ^ 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. caminar
  18. ^ 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. caminar
  19. ^ a b Moliner, María (2007), Diccionario de uso del español, 3rd ed., Madrid: Gredos, p. s.v. caminar
Cite this entry

“Caminar.” Etymologically, 7 Nov. 2026, etymologically.com/es/caminar. Accessed 7 Nov. 2026.

Last edited on . ·