cera

Forms

cera f (plural ceras)^[1] Old Spanish texts spell it cera, çera, zera and sera.^[2]

Etymology

It is inherited from Latin cēra (“wax”).^[3][4][5][1] The same Latin word is Portuguese cera, Galician cera, Asturian cera, Catalan cera, Occitan cera, French cire, Italian cera and Romanian ceară.^[6][7][8]

The Latin noun is related to Ancient Greek κηρός (kērós, “wax”), with a Doric form κᾱρός (kārós), and perhaps to Lithuanian korỹs (“honeycomb”).^[9][1] De Vaan considers it probably a loanword from an unknown language, or borrowed directly from Greek; if the Baltic words belong here, all of them may come from a lost substrate language.^[9] Wiktionary also names Albanian qiri as a cognate and calls the word a substrate loan.^[1] The Greek noun gave Spanish learned words such as cerote “cobbler's wax” and cerato.^[3][4]

Earliest recorded meaning

Corominas's first record is in Berceo, and the Breve diccionario dates it 1220–1250.^[3][4] In Berceo's Vida de Santo Domingo (c. 1230) a face turns oras verde, oras tal como cera “now green, now like wax”.^[10] The Fazienda de Ultra Mar (c. 1200, in a 13th-century copy) already says that the valleys will split como cera delant el fuego “like wax before the fire”.^[11]

Semantic evolution

Medieval texts use the word for the wax of candles offered in church, as Berceo's candela de cera, and for wax in medicine and the crafts.^[11][12] Covarrubias in 1611 named its chief use as giving light in candles, and recorded phrases such as hacer de alguno cera y pábilo “to do what one likes with someone” and derretirse como cera “to melt like wax”.^[13] Autoridades added the wax tablets on which the ancients wrote and the wax of the ears.^[14] The Academy's 1817 dictionary gave the sense “the candles used at a ceremony”.^[15]

In Mexico, Colombia and Ecuador cera also means a candle, especially one for church use.^[16] The modern dictionary adds depilatory wax, floor polish, a wax crayon, and in colloquial Spain an attack, physical or verbal; in the Dominican Republic it is the last coin one has.^[5][17]

Timeline

• c. 1200 – como cera delant el fuego in the Fazienda de Ultra Mar (in a 13th-century copy).^[11]
• 1218–c. 1250 – the Fuero de Zorita prescribes wax over a hand burnt in the ordeal of the hot iron.^[11]
• 1220–1250 – Berceo uses the word.^[3][4]
• 1250–1279 – Alfonso X's Lapidario.^[12]
• 1495 – Nebrija records encerar, cerote and cerapez.^[4][3]
• 1512 – first record from the Americas, in Puerto Rico.^[18]
• 1570 – first record of cerilla.^[4]
• 1611 – Covarrubias records phrases with cera.^[13]
• 1726–1739 – Autoridades records cera de los oídos.^[14]
• 1884 – the Academy gives the etymology from Latin cera.^[19]

Meanings

Noun

1. beeswax: the soft, yellowish, fusible substance that bees secrete to build the cells of the honeycomb, used above all for making candles; also that of some other insects.^[5][1]
2. Wax used for depilation.^[5]
3. The candles used at a ceremony.^[5]
4. polish for furniture and floors.^[5]
5. earwax.^[5][20]
6. (Spain) A wax crayon, and a picture made with crayons.^[5][1]
7. (Spain, colloquial) An attack, physical or verbal: En el debate hubo cera para todos.^[5]
8. (botany) A waxy coating on the leaves, flowers and fruit of some plants.^[5]
9. (zoology) The cere, the membrane at the base of the beak of some birds.^[5]
10. (in the plural) Among beekeepers, the wax cells of the hive.^[5]
11. (Mexico, Colombia, Ecuador) A candle.^[16]

Word family

• cerero
• cerería
• cerilla
• cerillo
• ceroso
• encerar
• encerado
• cerapez

Related words

• céreo
• cerumen
• cirio
• cerote
• Latin cera

Usage notes

The Academy's 1817 dictionary also gave cera as another form of acera “row of houses; pavement”, which Cabrera derived from Old Spanish facera “facing”.^[15][21] The form is still used in Leonese, and Alemany recorded a Murcian cera “water mill”, for aceña.^[22][23]

References

1. ^ a b c d e f g Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ Diccionario del Español Medieval electrónico (DEMel), data publication 2026 (CC BY-SA), Universität Rostock, p. s.v. cera
3. ^ a b c d e Corominas, Joan; Pascual, José A. (1980–1991), Diccionario crítico etimológico castellano e hispánico, 6 vols., Madrid: Gredos, p. 2, 39
4. ^ a b c d e f Corominas, Joan (1973), Breve diccionario etimológico de la lengua castellana, 3rd ed., Madrid: Gredos, p. s.v. cera
5. ^ 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. cera
6. ^ García de Diego, Vicente (1985), Diccionario etimológico español e hispánico, 2nd ed., Madrid: Espasa-Calpe (1st ed. 1954), p. 1584
7. ^ Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter
8. ^ Buchi, Éva; Schweickard, Wolfgang, eds. (2008–), Dictionnaire Étymologique Roman (DÉRom), Nancy: ATILF, http://www.atilf.fr/DERom
9. ^ a b de Vaan, Michiel (2008), Etymological Dictionary of Latin and the other Italic Languages, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 7, Leiden; Boston: Brill
10. ^ 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. 675
11. ^ a b c d Real Academia Española (2013–), Corpus del Diccionario histórico de la lengua española (CDH), version 3.1, https://apps.rae.es/CNDHE, p. s.v. cera
12. ^ 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. cera
13. ^ 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. 584
14. ^ a b Real Academia Española (1726–1739), Diccionario de la lengua castellana (Diccionario de Autoridades), 6 vols., Madrid: Francisco del Hierro, p. 2, 276
15. ^ a b Real Academia Española (1817), Diccionario de la lengua castellana, 5th ed., Madrid: Imprenta Real, p. 195
16. ^ a b Santamaría, Francisco J. (1942), Diccionario general de americanismos, 3 vols., México: Pedro Robredo, p. 347
17. ^ 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. cera
18. ^ 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. cera
19. ^ Real Academia Española (1884), Diccionario de la lengua castellana, 12th ed., Madrid: Imprenta de D. Gregorio Hernando (the first Academy edition with etymologies), p. 235
20. ^ Battaner Arias, Paz (dir.) (2017), Diccionario general de la lengua española VOX, Barcelona: Larousse Editorial, p. s.v. cera
21. ^ Cabrera, Ramón (1837), Diccionario de etimologías de la lengua castellana, 2 vols., Madrid: Imprenta de Marcos Bueno, p. 1
22. ^ Le Men Loyer, Janick (2002–2012), Léxico del leonés actual, 4 vols., León: Centro de Estudios e Investigación San Isidoro; electronic version, Universidad de León, p. s.v. cera
23. ^ Alemany y Bolufer, José (1917), Diccionario de la lengua española, Barcelona: Ramón Sopena, p. 368