culpable

Forms

culpable m or f (masculine and feminine plural culpables)^[1]

Etymology

It is borrowed from Latin culpābilis (“blameworthy; guilty”).^[2][1][3] Corominas dates it from the middle of the 16th century, but the CDH has it in 13th-century fueros.^[4][5]

The Latin adjective is formed from culpō (“to blame”) with the suffix -bilis; it is a late word, found in Apuleius and the Christian writers.^[6][7] The verb comes from culpa (“blame, guilt”), which de Vaan tentatively connects with Proto-Germanic words for “to bend, vault” and traces to a Proto-Indo-European noun *kʷolp-h₂-, perhaps first “a turning aside, a wrong”.^[8]

In French the Latin word was inherited as French coupable, first corpable in 1172.^[9] The learned forms are Catalan culpable, Portuguese culpável (14th century), Italian colpevole and Romanian culpabil.^[10][11][1]

Earliest recorded meaning

The Fuero de Zorita de los Canes (1218–c. 1250) uses it of a man brought before the judge: por que el iuez cate si es culpable de seer preso o no; et si culpable fuere, sea preso et retenido en la uilla “so that the judge may see whether he deserves to be imprisoned or not; and if he is found guilty, let him be seized and held in the town”.^[5] The Aragonese Vidal Mayor (c. 1250) and the Fuero de Teruel have it in the same legal sense.^[5][12]

Semantic evolution

For a long time the word was rarer than culpado, recorded from 1241.^[4] Autoridades took it as a derivative of culpar and defined it as “deserving blame”, quoting Quevedo and Saavedra Fajardo.^[13] The Academy's dictionaries of the 19th century defined it as one who is or can be blamed, said also of acts and inanimate things, and Gaspar y Roig marked the noun “offender” as a neologism.^[14][15]

Purists such as Baralt, Gagini, Batres and Román set culpable, one who can be blamed, against culpado, one who has actually committed the fault, and blamed French coupable or American usage for the confusion.^{[16][17][18][19]} The DLE now gives culpable the sense of having the blame for something and, in law, of being held responsible.^[2] In El Salvador and Honduras it is also a euphemism for an effeminate or homosexual man.^[20]

Timeline

• 1218–c. 1250 – the Fuero de Zorita de los Canes; the first record in the CDH.^[5]
• c. 1250 – the Aragonese Vidal Mayor.^[5]
• 1356 – the Fuero viejo de Castilla.^[5]
• 1499 – Fernández de Santaella's ecclesiastical vocabulary.^[21]
• 1534 – the first record from the Americas, in Peru: falló culpable al Cacique Atabalica.^[22]
• mid-16th century – Corominas's date of first record.^[4]
• 1726–1739 – Autoridades defines it as “deserving blame”.^[13]
• 1884 – the Academy gives the etymology, Latin culpabilis, and the use as a noun.^[23]

Meanings

Adjective

1. guilty: who has the blame for something; also as a noun: Al final el culpable fue el perro.^[2][1]
2. That implies guilt: un silencio culpable.^[2]
3. Feeling guilt: Me siento culpable por no haber llamado.^[1][24]
4. (law) Of a person: held responsible in civil or criminal law; also as a noun: El tribunal la declaró culpable.^[2]
5. (El Salvador, Honduras, euphemistic) An effeminate or homosexual man.^[20]

Word family

• culpabilidad

Related words

• culpa
• culpar
• culpado
• French coupable

References

1. ^ a b c d e f Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e 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. culpable
3. ^ Segura Munguía, Santiago (2001), Nuevo diccionario etimológico latín-español y de las voces derivadas, Bilbao: Universidad de Deusto, p. 183
4. ^ a b c Corominas, Joan (1973), Breve diccionario etimológico de la lengua castellana, 3rd ed., Madrid: Gredos, p. s.v. culpa
5. ^ a b c d e f Real Academia Española (2013–), Corpus del Diccionario histórico de la lengua española (CDH), version 3.1, https://apps.rae.es/CNDHE, p. s.v. culpable
6. ^ Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press, p. s.v. culpābilis
7. ^ Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press, p. s.v. culpābilis
8. ^ de Vaan, Michiel (2008), Etymological Dictionary of Latin and the other Italic Languages, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 7, Leiden; Boston: Brill, p. s.v. culpa
9. ^ Rey, Alain, ed. (1992), Dictionnaire historique de la langue française, Paris: Le Robert, p. s.v. coupable
10. ^ Alcover, Antoni M.; Moll, Francesc de B. (1930–1962), Diccionari català-valencià-balear, 10 vols., Palma de Mallorca: Moll, p. s.v. culpable
11. ^ Houaiss, Antônio; Villar, Mauro de Salles (2001), Dicionário Houaiss da língua portuguesa, Rio de Janeiro: Objetiva, p. s.v. culpável
12. ^ Diccionario del Español Medieval electrónico (DEMel), data publication 2026 (CC BY-SA), Universität Rostock, p. s.v. culpable
13. ^ a b Real Academia Española (1726–1739), Diccionario de la lengua castellana (Diccionario de Autoridades), 6 vols., Madrid: Francisco del Hierro, p. 2, 697
14. ^ Real Academia Española (1843), Diccionario de la lengua castellana, 9th ed., Madrid: Imprenta de D. Francisco María Fernández, p. 216
15. ^ 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, 698
16. ^ Baralt, Rafael María (1855), Diccionario de galicismos, Madrid: Imprenta de J. Cruzado, p. 200
17. ^ Gagini, Carlos (1893), Diccionario de barbarismos y provincialismos de Costa Rica, San José: Tipografía Nacional, p. 194
18. ^ Batres Jáuregui, Antonio (1892), Vicios del lenguaje y provincialismos de Guatemala, Guatemala: Encuadernación y Tipografía Nacional, p. 194
19. ^ 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. 473
20. ^ 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. culpable
21. ^ 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. 836
22. ^ 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. culpable
23. ^ Real Academia Española (1884), Diccionario de la lengua castellana, 12th ed., Madrid: Imprenta de D. Gregorio Hernando (the first Academy edition with etymologies), p. 321
24. ^ Moliner, María (2007), Diccionario de uso del español, 3rd ed., Madrid: Gredos, p. s.v. culpable