doce

Forms

doce (invariable)^[2][1] Old Spanish wrote doze, and also dodze, doize, doce and dose.^[3][4] Covarrubias still spells it doze in 1611;^[1] Autoridades has doce in 1732.^[5][6]

Etymology

It is inherited from Old Spanish doze, inherited from Latin duodecim (“twelve”).^[2][1][7] Cunha and Gómez de Silva give Vulgar Latin dodece as the intermediate form, and Old Spanish also had dodze.^[8][9][4] Corominas notes that the old language always had a voiced sibilant /dz/ here, written ⟨z⟩.^[7]

The same Latin numeral is Portuguese doze, Galician doce, Catalan dotze, Aragonese dotze, French douze, Occitan dotze, Italian dodici and Sardinian doighi.^{[10][4][1][11]}

The Latin numeral is a compound of duo (“two”) and decem (“ten”).^[12][1][7] The Greek numeral Ancient Greek δώδεκα (dṓdeka, “twelve”), formed in the same way, is the source of learned words such as dodecaedro and dodecágono.^[7]

Earliest recorded meaning

The corpus has it first in the Fuero de Zorita de los Canes (1218–c. 1250), in a rule on clearing oneself by oath: saluese con VI de doze connobrados “let him clear himself with six of twelve named men”.^[13] The Semejanza del mundo of about 1223 has doze vegadas “twelve times”.^[13] Corominas dates it from the beginnings of the language, with Berceo.^[7]

Semantic evolution

Alfonso X's Lapidario counts the doze signos “twelve signs” of the zodiac.^[14] Nebrija's Spanish–Latin vocabulary has Doze numero.^[15] Covarrubias in 1611 lists twelve signs, twelve hours of the day, twelve tribes and twelve apostles, and notes that many things are sold by the dozen.^[5] Autoridades in 1732 records the phrase echarlo a doce, to make a commotion so as to confuse a matter and stop people talking about it, with examples from Quevedo.^[6]

Today the numeral also serves as an ordinal for kings, years and days of the month, and the feminine plural las doce means noon or midnight.^[2][16] In Mexico al cuarto para las doce means “at the last minute”.^[17] Its derivative docena parallels French douzaine, which gave English dozen.^[10][7]

Timeline

• 1218–c. 1250 – the Fuero de Zorita de los Canes has doze.^[13]
• c. 1223 – the Semejanza del mundo: doze vegadas.^[13]
• c. 1230–1260 – Berceo uses doze and dodze.^[3][7]
• 1250–1279 – Alfonso X's Lapidario counts the doze signos.^[14]
• c. 1495 – Nebrija's vocabulary has Doze numero.^[15]
• 1611 – Covarrubias spells it doze.^[5]
• 1732 – Autoridades spells it doce and records echarlo a doce.^[6]

Meanings

Numeral

1. twelve: ten plus two: Compré doce huevos.^[2][1]
2. twelfth, placed after a name or noun as an ordinal, for kings, years and days of the month: Nació el doce de mayo.^[2][16]

Noun

1. The number twelve; the figure 12.^[2]
2. (feminine plural, las doce) noon or midnight: Quedamos a las doce.^[2][16]

Word family

• docena
• doceno
• doceañista

Related words

• duodécimo
• dodecaedro
• dos
• diez
• Latin duodecim

References

1. ^ a b c d e f g Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g 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. doce
3. ^ a b Boggs, R. S.; Kasten, Lloyd; Keniston, Hayward; Richardson, H. B. (1946), Tentative Dictionary of Medieval Spanish, 2 vols., Chapel Hill, N.C., p. 200
4. ^ a b c García de Diego, Vicente (1985), Diccionario etimológico español e hispánico, 2nd ed., Madrid: Espasa-Calpe (1st ed. 1954), p. s.v. duodecim
5. ^ a b c Covarrubias Orozco, Sebastián de (1611), Tesoro de la lengua castellana o española, Madrid: Luis Sánchez (Biblioteca Wordkers transcription, CC BY 4.0), p. 693
6. ^ a b c Real Academia Española (1726–1739), Diccionario de la lengua castellana (Diccionario de Autoridades), 6 vols., Madrid: Francisco del Hierro, p. 3, 324
7. ^ a b c d e f g Corominas, Joan; Pascual, José A. (1980–1991), Diccionario crítico etimológico castellano e hispánico, 6 vols., Madrid: Gredos, p. 2, 519
8. ^ Cunha, Antônio Geraldo da (2010), Dicionário etimológico da língua portuguesa, 4th ed., Rio de Janeiro: Lexikon, p. 1237
9. ^ Gómez de Silva, Guido (1988), Breve diccionario etimológico de la lengua española, México: Fondo de Cultura Económica / El Colegio de México, p. s.v. doce
10. ^ a b Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter, p. s.v. duodecim
11. ^ Alcover, Antoni M.; Moll, Francesc de B. (1930–1962), Diccionari català-valencià-balear, 10 vols., Palma de Mallorca: Moll, p. s.v. dotze
12. ^ Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press, p. s.v. duodecim
13. ^ 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. doce
14. ^ 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. doce
15. ^ 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. doce
16. ^ a b c Moliner, María (2007), Diccionario de uso del español, 3rd ed., Madrid: Gredos, p. s.v. doce
17. ^ Asociación de Academias de la Lengua Española (2010), Diccionario de americanismos, Lima: Santillana; online at https://www.asale.org/damer, p. s.v. doce