campaña

Forms

campaña f (plural campañas)^[1]

Etymology

It is inherited from Late Latin campānia (“level country, plain”), recorded from the 6th century.^[2][3][4][1] The Late Latin noun is the feminine of the adjective campāneus “of the plain”, from Latin campus (“level field”).^[1][5][6] The Academy's 2001 dictionary and Moliner start instead from a reconstructed *campanea.^[7][8] Gómez de Silva also connects it with the name of the plain near Naples, Latin Campania.^[9]

The same Late Latin word is Portuguese campanha, Catalan campanya, Occitan campanha, French champagne and Italian campagna; campagne has the initial consonant of Norman or Occitan.^[10][6][1] Spanish also has it in champaña and champán, borrowed from French, and probably in campiña, an Arabized variant.^[1][3]

The sense “military campaign” is a matter of debate.^[2][9] Corominas finds it in Ercilla in 1569, before the French word (1587) and the Italian one (1598) are found in this sense, and sees no reason to take it, or the sense “open country”, for a Gallicism.^[2] Gómez de Silva derives the military sense from French, which took it from Italian.^[9] The DELI dates the Italian sense “cycle of military operations” to before 1498, and Nocentini to the 15th century.^[11][6]

The Latin noun goes back to *kampos; de Vaan suggests that it may be a word of agriculture from a European substratum, while Wiktionary also gives the traditional derivation from Proto-Indo-European *kh₂emp- (“to bend”).^[12][1]

Earliest recorded meaning

Berceo uses it in the Vida de San Millán (c. 1230, known from an 18th-century copy) for flat land as against mountains: the saint's fame sonó por la campaña, “spread through the plain”.^[2][13][14]

Semantic evolution

The sense “open country” was very frequent in the Golden Age and survives in the Americas.^[2] In Don Quijote the knight runs por aquella campaña, and Sancho and his master go out en campaña, into the field.^[15] A 15th-century line of Santillana already uses it figuratively, of a noble enterprise.^[16]

From the 16th century the word named military operations.^[2] Autoridades distinguishes the ground an army occupies outside its quarters, and the season the armies spend in the field, usually from early May to late October.^[17] In 1817 the Academy added the navy's sense, the time from a ship's leaving port armed until its return.^[18] The sense “series of actions for an end”, political, press or advertising, spread in the 19th and 20th centuries; the Chilean purist Román objected to journalists' campañas for or against something.^[19][4] In the Río de la Plata the word means the countryside, the territory of a state or province outside the capital, a use Granada called old in 1890.^[20][21]

Timeline

• 1220–1250 – Berceo uses campaña for “plain, flat land”.^[3][2]
• 15th century – Santillana uses it figuratively.^[16]
• 1569 – Ercilla uses it for a military campaign.^[2]
• 1726–1739 – the Diccionario de Autoridades defines the plain, the army's field and the campaigning season.^[17]
• 1817 – the Academy adds the navy's sense.^[18]
• 1890 – Granada records the Río de la Plata sense “countryside”.^[20]
• 1901–1918 – Román objects to the press's use of campaña for a crusade or propaganda.^[19]

Meanings

Noun

1. Level, open country without hills: Desde la torre se ve la campaña.^[4][1]
2. A campaign: a set of actions aimed at a goal: una campaña contra el tabaco.^[4][1]
3. The period in which such actions take place, as an election or advertising campaign.^[4][8]
4. (military) A series of military operations; formerly, the time each year that armies spent out of their quarters.^[4][22]
5. (military) The length of a given military service.^[4]
6. (nautical) The period of a ship's or squadron's operations, from leaving port to returning.^[4]
7. (heraldry) The base of a shield, a band across its lower part.^[4][1]
8. (Argentina, Cuba, Ecuador, Honduras, Paraguay, Dominican Republic, Uruguay) The countryside.^[4][21]

Related words

• campiña
• campo
• champán
• Portuguese campanha
• Italian campagna

Usage notes

Tienda de campaña is a tent;^[1][4] batir la campaña and correr la campaña are military phrases for reconnoitring the country.^[1][4]

References

1. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h Corominas, Joan; Pascual, José A. (1980–1991), Diccionario crítico etimológico castellano e hispánico, 6 vols., Madrid: Gredos, p. 1, 791
3. ^ a b c Corominas, Joan (1973), Breve diccionario etimológico de la lengua castellana, 3rd ed., Madrid: Gredos, p. s.v. campo
4. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l 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. campaña
5. ^ Rey, Alain, ed. (1992), Dictionnaire historique de la langue française, Paris: Le Robert
6. ^ a b c Nocentini, Alberto; Parenti, Alessandro (2010), l'Etimologico: vocabolario della lingua italiana, Firenze: Le Monnier
7. ^ Real Academia Española (2001), Diccionario de la lengua española, 22nd ed., Madrid: Espasa-Calpe, p. s.v. campaña
8. ^ a b Moliner, María (2007), Diccionario de uso del español, 3rd ed., Madrid: Gredos, p. s.v. campaña
9. ^ a b c Gómez de Silva, Guido (1988), Breve diccionario etimológico de la lengua española, México: Fondo de Cultura Económica / El Colegio de México, p. s.v. campaña
10. ^ Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter
11. ^ Cortelazzo, Manlio; Zolli, Paolo (1999), Dizionario etimologico della lingua italiana, 2nd ed. by Manlio Cortelazzo and Michele A. Cortelazzo, Bologna: Zanichelli
12. ^ de Vaan, Michiel (2008), Etymological Dictionary of Latin and the other Italic Languages, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 7, Leiden; Boston: Brill
13. ^ Real Academia Española (2013–), Corpus del Diccionario histórico de la lengua española (CDH), version 3.1, https://apps.rae.es/CNDHE, p. s.v. campaña
14. ^ Diccionario del Español Medieval electrónico (DEMel), data publication 2026 (CC BY-SA), Universität Rostock, p. s.v. campaña
15. ^ Cejador y Frauca, Julio (1905–1906), La lengua de Cervantes: gramática y diccionario de la lengua castellana en El ingenioso hidalgo don Quijote de la Mancha, 2 vols., Madrid: Jaime Ratés, p. s.v. campaña
16. ^ a b 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. 600
17. ^ a b Real Academia Española (1726–1739), Diccionario de la lengua castellana (Diccionario de Autoridades), 6 vols., Madrid: Francisco del Hierro, p. 2, 99
18. ^ a b Real Academia Española (1817), Diccionario de la lengua castellana, 5th ed., Madrid: Imprenta Real, p. 165
19. ^ a b Román, Manuel Antonio (1901–1918), Diccionario de chilenismos y de otras voces y locuciones viciosas, 5 vols., Santiago de Chile: Imprenta de San José, p. 310
20. ^ a b Granada, Daniel (1890), Vocabulario rioplatense razonado, 2nd ed., Montevideo: Imprenta Rural, p. 110
21. ^ 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. campaña
22. ^ Battaner Arias, Paz (dir.) (2017), Diccionario general de la lengua española VOX, Barcelona: Larousse Editorial, p. s.v. campaña