confiar

Forms

confiar (first-person singular present confío, first-person singular preterite confié, past participle confiado)^[1]

Etymology

The Academy and Wiktionary take it as inherited from Vulgar Latin *confidāre, a form of cōnfīdō (“to trust”) remade like fiar, from *fidāre.^[2][1][3] The REW gives the same base for Italian confidare, French confier, Catalan confiar and Portuguese confiar.^[4] Corominas instead sees a verb formed separately by the western Romance languages on the model of the Latin one, pointing to the late dates of the French verb (15th century), Old Occitan confizar (early 13th century) and the Catalan and Italian verbs (late 13th century).^[5]

The base fīdō (“to trust”) belongs with fidēs (“faith, trust”).^[6] Corominas dates the Vulgar Latin verb to at least the 5th century, from the derivative fidamen in a Latin poem of that time.^[5]

Earliest recorded meaning

Corominas found no example before the Seguro de Tordesillas of about 1440 and noted its absence from the Cid, Berceo and the other early texts he searched.^[5] The CDH has it much earlier, in the Fuero de Zorita de los Canes (1218–1250): a debtor who will not give a guarantor, confiando se enla calonna delas casas, “trusting in the fine that protects houses”, must be put out of the house.^[7] The DEMel's earliest record is the Fuero de Plasencia of 1221.^[8]

Semantic evolution

The first sense was “to trust, rely on” (confiar en Dios), and Alfonso X's prose also has it for “to hope firmly” and for entrusting something to someone's care.^[9][7] Nebrija in about 1495 construed it with de, giving Latin fido and confido.^[10] Autoridades separated the intransitive “to hope, trust”, the transitive “to entrust property or a secret to someone on trust alone”, and a third sense, “to give someone hope”.^[11] Cuervo documents the shift from confiar algo de alguien to confiar algo a alguien.^[12]

The Academy's dictionaries of 1884 and 1899 explained it as con and fiar, and the current one derives it from Vulgar Latin.^[13][2] Modern usage adds “to confide (a secret)” and the reflexive confiarse, “to be overconfident, drop one's guard”.^[14]

Timeline

• 1218–1250 – the Fuero de Zorita de los Canes has confiandose.^[7]
• 1221 – the Fuero de Plasencia has confiando.^[8]
• 1280 – Alfonso X's General Estoria: confio yo en dios “I trust in God”.^[9][7]
• c. 1400 – the noun confianza in the Cancionero de Baena.^[5]
• c. 1440 – Corominas's date of first record, the Seguro de Tordesillas.^[5]
• c. 1495 – Nebrija: confiar de otra cosa.^[10]
• 1548 – first record from the Americas, in Santo Domingo.^[15]
• 1726–1739 – Autoridades distinguishes the intransitive and transitive verbs.^[11]
• 1884 – the Academy's dictionary explains it as con + fiar.^[13]

Meanings

Verb

1. (transitive) To entrust: to put a task or thing in someone's care: Le confiaron las llaves del archivo.^[2][1]
2. (transitive, also reflexive) To leave property, a secret or anything else with someone, relying only on their good faith; to confide a secret.^[2][14]
3. (transitive) To give someone hope that they will get what they want.^[2]
4. (intransitive, also reflexive) To trust, to hope firmly, usually with en: Confío en que llegue a tiempo.^[2][16]
5. (reflexive) To be overconfident and drop one's guard.^[14]

Word family

• confiable
• desconfiar
• confianza
• desconfianza

Related words

• confiado
• confidente
• fiar
• confidencia
• Latin cōnfīdō
• French confier

Usage notes

The present has a stressed í: confío, confías.^[1] The older construction with de (confiar de la misericordia de Dios) gave way to en for the person or thing trusted and a for the person entrusted.^[12][15]

References

1. ^ a b c d e Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f 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. confiar
3. ^ García de Diego, Vicente (1985), Diccionario etimológico español e hispánico, 2nd ed., Madrid: Espasa-Calpe (1st ed. 1954), p. s.v. confiar
4. ^ Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter
5. ^ a b c d e Corominas, Joan; Pascual, José A. (1980–1991), Diccionario crítico etimológico castellano e hispánico, 6 vols., Madrid: Gredos, p. 2, 885
6. ^ Lleal, Coloma (dir.), DICCA-XV: Diccionario del castellano del siglo XV en la Corona de Aragón, Barcelona: Universitat de Barcelona, Grup d'Estudis d'Història de la Llengua (GHCL), https://ghcl.ub.edu/diccaxv, p. s.v. confiar
7. ^ 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. confiar
8. ^ a b Diccionario del Español Medieval electrónico (DEMel), data publication 2026 (CC BY-SA), Universität Rostock, p. s.v. confiar
9. ^ 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. confiar
10. ^ a b Nebrija, Antonio de (1513), Vocabulario español-latino, Salamanca, ed. Marina Vidal Díez (2007), Biblioteca Virtual Miguel de Cervantes, p. 316
11. ^ a b Real Academia Española (1726–1739), Diccionario de la lengua castellana (Diccionario de Autoridades), 6 vols., Madrid: Francisco del Hierro, p. 2, 499
12. ^ a b 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. 2, 357
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. 274
14. ^ a b c Battaner Arias, Paz (dir.) (2017), Diccionario general de la lengua española VOX, Barcelona: Larousse Editorial, p. s.v. confiar
15. ^ 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. confiar
16. ^ Moliner, María (2007), Diccionario de uso del español, 3rd ed., Madrid: Gredos, p. s.v. confiar