distinguir

Forms

distinguir (first-person singular present distingo, first-person singular preterite distinguí, past participle distinguido)^[1] Old Spanish and Aragonese texts have destinguir beside distinguir.^[2]

Etymology

It is borrowed from Latin distinguō (“to separate, divide; to distinguish”).^[3][4][1] Corominas dates it to the second half of the 13th century.^[3] Nascentes calls the Portuguese word semi-learned.^[5]

The same Latin word is Portuguese distinguir, Catalan distingir, French distinguer and Italian distinguere.^[1][6][7] The French word was borrowed in 1310.^[7]

The Latin verb is formed from dis- (“apart”) and a simple verb *stinguō that is not attested, the base of īnstīgō (“to goad”) and exstinguō (“to extinguish”).^[8][6] The DHLF gives a root meaning “to prick”, also found in Ancient Greek στίζω (stízō, “to prick, tattoo”), so that the verb first meant to separate by a mark pricked in.^[7][9]

Earliest recorded meaning

The earliest hit in the CDH is the Navarro-Aragonese Vidal Mayor (c. 1250): if a document is challenged in court es de destinguir cuerdament “one must distinguish wisely” whether it is false.^[2] The DEMel's first record in a primary source is the translation of Seneca's De ira (1284–1295), with distinguen.^[10]

Semantic evolution

The earliest uses are of telling things apart and of dividing them: Pope Benedict XIII divides his book into fifteen parts with distinguimos (before 1417).^[2] Nebrija glossed it as setting one thing apart from another, and Covarrubias as separating or making a difference between things.^[11][12] The Diccionario de Autoridades added the senses of making something differ from another and of clearing up a confusion, quoting Cervantes on telling sounds apart.^[13]

The Academy's 1817 edition has the sense of seeing clearly at a distance and the figurative one of holding someone in special esteem, besides the scholastic use for clarifying a proposition by a distinction.^[14] The reflexive appears in 1843 for behaving with distinction among others, and in 1869 as “to stand out”.^[15][16] In rural Caribbean Colombia it also means to know a person.^[17]

Timeline

• c. 1250 – the Vidal Mayor has destinguir.^[2]
• 1284–1295 – the Spanish De ira of Seneca has distinguen.^[10]
• after 1350 – the translation of Jacques de Vitry's Historia de Jerusalem says that two cities se distinguen in Scripture.^[2]
• c. 1495 – Nebrija glosses it with Latin distinguo.^[11]
• 1611 – Covarrubias defines it as separating or making a difference.^[12]
• 1765–1783 – the noun distingo, from the Latin first person distinguo of scholastic logic, is first recorded.^[3]
• 1817 – the Academy records seeing clearly at a distance and holding someone in esteem.^[14]
• 1869 – the Academy records the reflexive “to stand out among others”.^[16]

Meanings

Verb

1. To distinguish: to know the difference between things: No distingue un vino joven de uno de reserva.^[4][1]
2. To make something different from another thing by a feature, mark or emblem; also reflexive.^[4]
3. Of a quality or conduct: to characterize someone or something.^[4][18]
4. To state the difference between one thing and another with which it could be confused.^[4]
5. To make out something in spite of distance, haze or weak sight: Desde la torre distinguimos las luces del puerto.^[4][1]
6. To hold certain people in special esteem, preferring them to others.^[4][19]
7. To award someone a dignity, privilege or honour.^[4]
8. (historical) In the old universities, to explain a proposition by means of a distinción.^[4]
9. (reflexive) To stand out, excel among others.^[4][1]
10. (Caribbean Colombia, rural) To know, be acquainted with a person.^[17]

Word family

• distinguido

Related words

• distinción
• distinto
• extinguir
• distingo
• Latin distinguō

References

1. ^ a b c d e f g Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ 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. distinguir
3. ^ a b c Corominas, Joan (1973), Breve diccionario etimológico de la lengua castellana, 3rd ed., Madrid: Gredos, p. s.v. distinguir
4. ^ a b c d e f g h i j 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. distinguir
5. ^ Nascentes, Antenor (1966), Dicionário etimológico resumido, Rio de Janeiro: Instituto Nacional do Livro, p. s.v. distinguir
6. ^ a b Coromines, Joan (1980–2001), Diccionari etimològic i complementari de la llengua catalana, 10 vols., Barcelona: Curial / La Caixa (online ed., Institut d'Estudis Catalans 2024), p. 3, 151
7. ^ a b c Rey, Alain, ed. (1992), Dictionnaire historique de la langue française, Paris: Le Robert, p. s.v. distinguer
8. ^ Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
9. ^ Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press, p. s.v. distinguo
10. ^ a b Diccionario del Español Medieval electrónico (DEMel), data publication 2026 (CC BY-SA), Universität Rostock, p. s.v. distinguir
11. ^ a b Nebrija, Antonio de (1513), Vocabulario español-latino, Salamanca, ed. Marina Vidal Díez (2007), Biblioteca Virtual Miguel de Cervantes, p. 337
12. ^ 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. 683
13. ^ Real Academia Española (1726–1739), Diccionario de la lengua castellana (Diccionario de Autoridades), 6 vols., Madrid: Francisco del Hierro, p. 3, 312
14. ^ a b Real Academia Española (1817), Diccionario de la lengua castellana, 5th ed., Madrid: Imprenta Real, p. 331
15. ^ Real Academia Española (1843), Diccionario de la lengua castellana, 9th ed., Madrid: Imprenta de D. Francisco María Fernández, p. 268
16. ^ a b Real Academia Española (1869), Diccionario de la lengua castellana, 11th ed., Madrid: Imprenta de Don Manuel Rivadeneyra, p. 286
17. ^ 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. distinguir
18. ^ Battaner Arias, Paz (dir.) (2017), Diccionario general de la lengua española VOX, Barcelona: Larousse Editorial, p. s.v. distinguir
19. ^ Moliner, María (2007), Diccionario de uso del español, 3rd ed., Madrid: Gredos, p. s.v. distinguir