esplendor

Forms

esplendor m (plural esplendores)^[1] Old Spanish also wrote esprandor and esplandor.^[2][3] In the Americas explendor and esplandores are found in the 16th–18th centuries.^[4]

Etymology

It is borrowed from Latin splendor (“brightness, brilliance; magnificence”), a learned word.^[2][5][6][1] The Latin noun is formed from splendeō (“to shine, be bright”) with the suffix -or.^[7][1] Nascentes calls the Portuguese word semi-learned.^[8]

The same Latin word is Portuguese esplendor, Catalan esplendor, French splendeur and Italian splendore.^[9][10][11]

For the Latin verb de Vaan reconstructs Proto-Indo-European *spl̥nd(h)-eh₁- (“to be manifest”), and compares Old Irish sluindid (“to express, declare, name”).^[12] He thinks it conceivable, in view of the Celtic sense, that the root is related to *(s)pelH- (“to speak in public”).^[12]

resplandor has its own source, resplendeō, perhaps through Old French.^[2]

Earliest recorded meaning

Corominas's first record is esprandor in the Poema de Alfonso XI (about 1350).^[2][5] The CDH reads esplandor there, of the weapons of the Spanish vanguard shining como llamas de foguera “like the flames of a bonfire”.^[3] In Juan Fernández de Heredia's Plutarch (1379–1384) it is the light that the moon receives from the sun.^[3]

Semantic evolution

The word is missing from Alonso de Palencia, Nebrija's Spanish–Latin dictionary and Covarrubias, but it became common from the early 17th century and was a characteristic word of Góngora's vocabulary.^[2] Nebrija's Latin dictionary renders Latin splendor by resplandor.^[13] Cervantes uses it figuratively: Don Quijote is esplendor de España.^[14]

Autoridades gives the light of a shining body, then figuratively lustre, esteem, honour and excellence, and in painting a white colour made of eggshells for illuminations and miniatures.^[15] The Academy marked the painting sense as obsolete in 1869.^[16] The DLE now adds “apogee, height”, as in the period of greatest splendour of an empire.^[6][17]

Timeline

• c. 1350 – esprandor in the Poema de Alfonso XI.^[2][5]
• 1379–1384 – esplendor in Fernández de Heredia's translation of Plutarch.^[3]
• 15th century – further examples collected by C. C. Smith.^[2]
• 1578 – the first record from the Americas, explendor in Mexico City.^[4]
• early 17th century – the word becomes frequent, especially in Góngora.^[2]
• 1869 – the Academy marks the painters' sense as obsolete.^[16]
• 1884 – the Academy gives the etymology from Latin splendor;^[18] esplendoroso enters its dictionary.^[18][5]

Meanings

Noun

1. resplandor; brilliance, radiance: el esplendor de las estrellas.^[6][17]
2. lustre, nobility, especially of a family.^[6][17]
3. Magnificence, splendour of things rich and beautiful.^[17][1]
4. apogee, peak: la ciudad en su época de mayor esplendor.^[6][17]

Word family

• esplendoroso

Related words

• espléndido
• esplender
• resplandor
• resplandecer
• Latin splendor

References

1. ^ a b c d e Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h Corominas, Joan; Pascual, José A. (1980–1991), Diccionario crítico etimológico castellano e hispánico, 6 vols., Madrid: Gredos, p. 2, 749
3. ^ 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. esplendor
4. ^ 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. esplandor
5. ^ a b c d Corominas, Joan (1973), Breve diccionario etimológico de la lengua castellana, 3rd ed., Madrid: Gredos, p. s.v. esplender
6. ^ 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. esplendor
7. ^ Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press, p. s.v. splendor
8. ^ Nascentes, Antenor (1966), Dicionário etimológico resumido, Rio de Janeiro: Instituto Nacional do Livro, p. s.v. esplendor
9. ^ Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter, p. 8165
10. ^ Houaiss, Antônio; Villar, Mauro de Salles (2001), Dicionário Houaiss da língua portuguesa, Rio de Janeiro: Objetiva, p. s.v. esplendor
11. ^ 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, 655
12. ^ a b 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. splendeō
13. ^ 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. esplendor
14. ^ Cejador y Frauca, Julio (1905–1906), La lengua de Cervantes: gramática y diccionario de la lengua castellana en El ingenioso hidalgo don Quijote de la Mancha, 2 vols., Madrid: Jaime Ratés, p. 498
15. ^ Real Academia Española (1726–1739), Diccionario de la lengua castellana (Diccionario de Autoridades), 6 vols., Madrid: Francisco del Hierro, p. 3, 610
16. ^ a b Real Academia Española (1869), Diccionario de la lengua castellana, 11th ed., Madrid: Imprenta de Don Manuel Rivadeneyra, p. 334
17. ^ a b c d e Moliner, María (2007), Diccionario de uso del español, 3rd ed., Madrid: Gredos, p. s.v. esplendor
18. ^ 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. 461