danzar

Forms

danzar (first-person singular present danzo, first-person singular preterite dancé, past participle danzado)^[1]

Etymology

It is borrowed from Old French dancier (“to dance”), modern French danser, a word whose own origin is unknown.^[2][3][4] In Wiktionary's account it is inherited from Old Spanish dançar, from a Vulgar Latin *dantiāre, itself of disputed origin.^[1] From French the verb spread to the other Romance languages and also to English dance, German tanzen (about 1200) and Basque dantza.^[2][5] At first it named the solemn dance of one person or the more refined kind of group dance, as opposed to the popular word Old French baler;^[1][6] Spanish and Italian have kept this nuance.^[2] The same verb is Portuguese dançar, Catalan dansar, Occitan dansar and Italian danzare.^[1][6]

The source of the French word has long been debated.^[2] Diez derived it from Old High German dansōn (“to pull, draw out”), which the DCECH rejects because a Germanic /s/ could not give the ⟨c⟩ of Old French.^[2] Brüch proposed Frankish *dintjan (“to move to and fro”), from Frisian, Middle Dutch and Low German words for trembling and drawing back;^[5][6] Wartburg and the REW accepted it, and so do the DHLF and Cunha.^[2][5][6] Corominas objects that the Old French rhymes point to an original /a/, not /e/, and that the Germanic words disagree in both form and meaning.^[2] Wiktionary mentions a link with Proto-Germanic *þansōn as possible but uncertain.^[1]

Corominas himself suggested an origin in Andalusian Arabic.^[7][2] He starts from an Arabic root meaning “to be dirty, defiled”, whose derivatives include words for impurity and for houses of ill fame, and supposes that an Andalusian noun Andalusian Arabic *dansa meant a lewd tavern dance, so called by the Muslim jurists; carried to southern France by the Andalusian dancing girls of the troubadours' time, the word would have become a noble one there.^[2][7] In support he notes that Old Occitan dansar and dansa are as old as the French words, in poets of the late 12th century, and that the verb is well rooted in all the Ibero-Romance languages almost from the same date.^[2][7]

Earliest recorded meaning

The first records are in Alfonso X's General Estoria (c. 1275), where people dance and leap to music: aun dançar e sotar los que los tanxiessen “and even dance and jump, those who played them”.^[8][9][2] The second part tells how people andauan todos alli dançando & faziendo quirola, “all went about dancing there and making merry”.^[8] The noun dança is in the Libro de los caballos of about the same date, and Galician-Portuguese dança already in the Cantigas of about 1250.^[8][2]

Semantic evolution

The DCECH finds the verb frequent from the second half of the 14th century, and Nebrija gave dançar o bailar with Latin salto.^[2][10] The Diccionario de Autoridades defined it as dancing with gravity to an instrument, with order and training, as against ordinary bailar.^[11] It also recorded the sense “to move quickly, bubbling and jumping”, with Quevedo's stew that went danzando por todo el garrafón, and the figurative sacar a danzar “to drag someone into an affair”.^[11] Autoridades reports that Covarrubias derived the verb from Latin dūcō (“to lead”), because one dancer leads the others, and preferred a Germanic origin itself.^[11]

The Academy's dictionary of 1843 added the familiar sense “to meddle in a business”, mostly said in reproach of someone who interferes in what does not concern him.^[12] Moliner notes that danzar is used above all of artistic dances, while bailar is the everyday word.^[4] Derivatives include danza, danzante (1627) and danzarín (1732); contradanza (1732) came from French contredanse, itself from English country-dance.^[7]

Timeline

• c. 1250 – Galician-Portuguese dança in the Cantigas.^[2]
• c. 1275 – dançar in Alfonso X's General Estoria, the first record.^[8][9]
• c. 1280 – the DCECH's own first record, also in the General Estoria.^[2][7]
• c. 1495 – Nebrija gives dançar o bailar with Latin salto.^[10][2]
• 1527 – the first record from the Americas: a dancing school leased in Mexico City.^[13]
• 1627 – first record of the derivative danzante.^[7]
• 1732 – the Diccionario de Autoridades lists the verb;^[12] danzarín and contradanza are first recorded.^[11][7]
• 1843 – the Academy's dictionary adds the figurative sense “to meddle”.^[12]
• 1884 – the Academy derives the verb from Old High German dansón “to stretch”, an etymology later given up.^[14][3]

Meanings

Verb

1. (intransitive, also transitive) To dance, especially in a formal or artistic way; transitively, to dance a particular dance: danzar una jota.^[3][4]
2. (intransitive, of a thing) To move quickly, bobbing and jumping about.^[3]
3. (intransitive) To go to and fro, to be busy without achieving much.^[4][15]
4. (intransitive, colloquial) To meddle in an affair, usually said in reproach of someone who interferes where he has no business.^[3]

Word family

• danza
• danzante
• danzarín
• danzón

Related words

• contradanza
• bailar
• French danser
• Italian danzare

References

1. ^ a b c d e f Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p Corominas, Joan; Pascual, José A. (1980–1991), Diccionario crítico etimológico castellano e hispánico, 6 vols., Madrid: Gredos, p. 2, 423
3. ^ 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. danzar
4. ^ a b c d Moliner, María (2007), Diccionario de uso del español, 3rd ed., Madrid: Gredos, p. s.v. danzar
5. ^ a b c Rey, Alain, ed. (1992), Dictionnaire historique de la langue française, Paris: Le Robert
6. ^ a b c d Cunha, Antônio Geraldo da (2010), Dicionário etimológico da língua portuguesa, 4th ed., Rio de Janeiro: Lexikon, p. 1082
7. ^ a b c d e f g Corominas, Joan (1973), Breve diccionario etimológico de la lengua castellana, 3rd ed., Madrid: Gredos, p. s.v. danzar
8. ^ 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. danzar
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. danzar
10. ^ a b 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. danzar
11. ^ a b c d Real Academia Española (1726–1739), Diccionario de la lengua castellana (Diccionario de Autoridades), 6 vols., Madrid: Francisco del Hierro, p. 3, 6
12. ^ a b c Real Academia Española (1843), Diccionario de la lengua castellana, 9th ed., Madrid: Imprenta de D. Francisco María Fernández, p. 225
13. ^ 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. danzar
14. ^ Real Academia Española (1884), Diccionario de la lengua castellana, 12th ed., Madrid: Imprenta de D. Gregorio Hernando (the first Academy edition with etymologies), p. 335
15. ^ Battaner Arias, Paz (dir.) (2017), Diccionario general de la lengua española VOX, Barcelona: Larousse Editorial, p. s.v. danzar