cavidad

Forms

cavidad f (plural cavidades)^[1]

Etymology

It is borrowed from Late Latin cavitās (“hollowness, a hollow”), a learned word.^[2][3][4][1] The Latin noun is formed from cavus (“hollow”) with the suffix -tās.^[1][5] It is a Late Latin word, used by Caelius Aurelianus as an anatomical term.^[6][5]

The same Latin word is Portuguese cavidade, Italian cavità, French cavité and English cavity.^[7][8] French has it from the 13th century.^[6]

The adjective is also the source of cavāre, from which Spanish cavar is inherited.^[3] De Vaan connects it, with doubt, with Ancient Greek κύαρ (kúar, “hole, eye of a needle”) and a root Proto-Indo-European *ḱuH- (“to swell”).^[9]

Earliest recorded meaning

The CDH's first record is the Anothomía of Bernardino Montaña de Monserrate (1551), on the shape of the nose: la magnitud y cauidad de las narizes “the size and hollow of the nostrils”.^[10] The BDELC dates the word only from 1607, and the DCECH from Ruiz de Alarcón, about 1630.^[4][3]

Semantic evolution

The word entered Spanish as a term of anatomy: Huarte de San Juan writes of the cavidades of the body, and the medical writers of 1598 of the hollow of the bones and of the chest.^[10] Poets soon used it for any hollow, as Quevedo did of an empty skull.^[10]

The Diccionario de Autoridades defined it as a depth, hollow, pit or hole, and separately as the hollow parts of the body in the language of physicians and anatomists.^[11] Gaspar y Roig listed the anatomical phrases cavidad abdominal, cavidad torácica and the cavidades of the heart.^[12] The Academy derived it from cavo in 1884, and Alemany in 1917 from Latin cavitas.^[13][14] Moliner extends it to a hollow in a surface and to any concave shape.^[15]

Timeline

• 1551 – Bernardino Montaña de Monserrate's Anothomía, the CDH's first record.^[10]
• 1575–1588 – Huarte de San Juan's Examen de ingenios writes of the cavidades of the body.^[10]
• 1607 – the BDELC's date for the word.^[4][8]
• c. 1630 – Ruiz de Alarcón, the DCECH's first record.^[3]
• 1716 – the first record from the Americas, in Guatemala.^[16]
• 1726–1739 – the Diccionario de Autoridades gives the general and the anatomical sense.^[11]
• 1884 – the Academy's dictionary derives it from cavo.^[13]

Meanings

Noun

1. A cavity or hollow: an empty space inside a body of any kind: El agua había abierto una cavidad en la roca.^[2][1]
2. (anatomy) A hollow space in the body or in one of its organs: cavidad torácica, cavidad bucal.^[6][15]
3. A hollow in a surface, or any concave shape: Hizo una cavidad con las palmas para recoger el agua.^[15]

Related words

• cavar
• caverna
• cóncavo
• concavidad
• Latin cavus
• Portuguese cavidade

Usage notes

In zoology the cavidad paleal is the space under the mantle of molluscs that holds the gills.^[2]

References

1. ^ a b c d e Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c 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. cavidad
3. ^ a b c d Corominas, Joan; Pascual, José A. (1980–1991), Diccionario crítico etimológico castellano e hispánico, 6 vols., Madrid: Gredos, p. 1, 929
4. ^ a b c Corominas, Joan (1973), Breve diccionario etimológico de la lengua castellana, 3rd ed., Madrid: Gredos, p. s.v. cavar
5. ^ a b Gómez de Silva, Guido (1988), Breve diccionario etimológico de la lengua española, México: Fondo de Cultura Económica / El Colegio de México, p. 163
6. ^ a b c Real Academia Nacional de Medicina (2011), Diccionario de términos médicos, Madrid: Editorial Médica Panamericana; online at https://dtme.ranm.es, p. s.v. cavidad
7. ^ Houaiss, Antônio; Villar, Mauro de Salles (2001), Dicionário Houaiss da língua portuguesa, Rio de Janeiro: Objetiva, p. s.v. cavidade
8. ^ a b Segura Munguía, Santiago (2001), Nuevo diccionario etimológico latín-español y de las voces derivadas, Bilbao: Universidad de Deusto, p. 109
9. ^ de Vaan, Michiel (2008), Etymological Dictionary of Latin and the other Italic Languages, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 7, Leiden; Boston: Brill
10. ^ 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. cavidad
11. ^ a b Real Academia Española (1726–1739), Diccionario de la lengua castellana (Diccionario de Autoridades), 6 vols., Madrid: Francisco del Hierro, p. 2, 241
12. ^ Gaspar y Roig (eds.) (1853–1855), Biblioteca ilustrada de Gaspar y Roig: Diccionario enciclopédico de la lengua española, 2 vols., Madrid: Imprenta y Librería de Gaspar y Roig, p. 1, 526
13. ^ 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. 228
14. ^ Alemany y Bolufer, José (1917), Diccionario de la lengua española, Barcelona: Ramón Sopena, p. 357
15. ^ a b c Moliner, María (2007), Diccionario de uso del español, 3rd ed., Madrid: Gredos, p. s.v. cavidad
16. ^ 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. cavidad