fiar

Forms

fiar (first-person singular present fío, first-person singular preterite fie, past participle fiado)^[1]

Etymology

It is inherited from Old Spanish fiar, inherited from Vulgar Latin *fīdāre, a change of conjugation of Latin fīdere (“to trust”).^[2][3][4][1] All the Romance languages that keep the verb, all those of the West, point to *fīdāre, which already existed in the 5th century, as the derivative fidāmen in a Latin poem of that time shows.^[2] In medieval Castilian, where it was very common, the pronunciation of the educated classes prevailed because of the verb's legal use, hence the kept /f/; this does not make it a learned word.^[2]

The same verb is Portuguese fiar, Galician fiar, Catalan fiar, Occitan fisar, French fier and Italian fidare.^[5][1][6]

fīdō goes back to Proto-Italic *feiþe-, from Proto-Indo-European *bʰeydʰ- (“to trust”); it is related to fidēs (“faith, trust”) and foedus (“treaty”), and outside Latin to Proto-Germanic *bīdaną.^[7][1] The OLD and Segura compare Ancient Greek πείθομαι (peíthomai, “to trust, obey”).^[8][9]

Earliest recorded meaning

The Cantar de mio Cid (c. 1140, in a 14th-century copy) has the sense “to trust”: yo fío por Dios que en nuestro pro eñadrán “I trust in God that they will add to our profit”.^[10][2][11] In the Cid the thing trusted in is introduced with por and once with en.^[12] The Fuero de Madrid (1141–1235) uses it of standing surety for someone in court.^[10]

Semantic evolution

The legal sense “to stand surety for” is old: fiador “guarantor” is recorded in 1074 and fianza “surety” (as fidanza) in 1095, and Alfonso X's laws say which clerics may not act as guarantors.^[2][3][13] Alfonso's prose also has “to trust in” and “to hope firmly for”.^[13] Covarrubias (1611) adds “to entrust” (fiar la bolsa to a servant) and selling on credit, to be paid at a fixed term.^[14] Autoridades has the same three senses, guaranteeing, selling on credit and confiding.^[15]

In the Americas fiar is recorded from 1529, in Nicaragua, of men standing surety for a sum.^[16] Today in Nicaragua, the Dominican Republic, Puerto Rico, Venezuela and Paraguay it also means “to buy on credit”.^[17] Gaspar y Roig record the proverb no fíes, ni porfíes, ni prestes, vivirás entre las gentes.^[18]

Timeline

• 1074 – the derivative fiador in a charter.^[2][3]
• 1095 – fidanza “surety” in a charter.^[2]
• c. 1140 – fiar “to trust” and desafiar in the Cantar de mio Cid.^[2][3][10]
• 1141–1235 – the Fuero de Madrid uses it of standing surety.^[10]
• 1254 – Alfonso X's Judizios use it for “to hope firmly”.^[13]
• c. 1440 – the compound confiar appears.^[2]
• 1529 – the first record from the Americas, in Nicaragua.^[16]
• 1611 – Covarrubias records the sense “to sell on credit”.^[14]

Meanings

Verb

1. (transitive) To guarantee: to answer for another's promise or debt, undertaking to pay if they do not.^[4][1]
2. (transitive) To sell on credit, to be paid later: el panadero nos fía hasta fin de mes.^[4][1][19]
3. (transitive, also reflexive) To entrust or confide something to someone: fió el cuidado de la casa a su sobrina.^[4][1]
4. (transitive, obsolete) To secure, make firm.^[4]
5. (intransitive, mostly reflexive) To trust in someone or something: no te fíes de los desconocidos.^[4][1][20]
6. (intransitive) To hope firmly for something good: fío en que llegarán a tiempo.^[4]
7. (Nicaragua, Dominican Republic, Puerto Rico, Venezuela, Paraguay) To buy on credit.^[17]

Word family

• fiado
• fiador
• fianza
• fiable
• fiadura
• confiar
• desafiar
• afianzar
• fiaduría

Related words

• confianza
• confidencial
• desafío
• desconfiado
• fe
• fiel
• Latin fīdō
• Portuguese fiar
• French fier

Usage notes

De fiar means “trustworthy” (ser de fiar).^[4][20] ¡Muy largo me lo fiáis! expresses doubt that something promised far ahead will happen.^[20][9] In verse the i of fiar, fiador and fianza counts as a syllable of its own, as in fío.^[21]

References

1. ^ a b c d e f g h i Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i Corominas, Joan; Pascual, José A. (1980–1991), Diccionario crítico etimológico castellano e hispánico, 6 vols., Madrid: Gredos, p. 2, 885
3. ^ a b c d Corominas, Joan (1973), Breve diccionario etimológico de la lengua castellana, 3rd ed., Madrid: Gredos, p. s.v. fiar
4. ^ a b c d e f g h 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. fiar
5. ^ Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter, p. 3282
6. ^ Alcover, Antoni M.; Moll, Francesc de B. (1930–1962), Diccionari català-valencià-balear, 10 vols., Palma de Mallorca: Moll, p. s.v. fiar
7. ^ de Vaan, Michiel (2008), Etymological Dictionary of Latin and the other Italic Languages, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 7, Leiden; Boston: Brill
8. ^ Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
9. ^ a b Segura Munguía, Santiago (2014), Lexicón etimológico y semántico del latín y de las voces actuales que proceden de raíces latinas o griegas, Bilbao: Universidad de Deusto, p. 257
10. ^ 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. fiar
11. ^ Boggs, R. S.; Kasten, Lloyd; Keniston, Hayward; Richardson, H. B. (1946), Tentative Dictionary of Medieval Spanish, 2 vols., Chapel Hill, N.C., p. 258
12. ^ Menéndez Pidal, Ramón (1908–1911), Cantar de Mio Cid: texto, gramática y vocabulario, 3 vols., Madrid: Bailly-Baillière, p. 280
13. ^ a b c 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. fiar
14. ^ 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. 840
15. ^ Real Academia Española (1726–1739), Diccionario de la lengua castellana (Diccionario de Autoridades), 6 vols., Madrid: Francisco del Hierro, p. 3, 743
16. ^ 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. fiar
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. fiar
18. ^ 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, 1004
19. ^ Battaner Arias, Paz (dir.) (2017), Diccionario general de la lengua española VOX, Barcelona: Larousse Editorial, p. s.v. fiar
20. ^ a b c Moliner, María (2007), Diccionario de uso del español, 3rd ed., Madrid: Gredos, p. s.v. fiar
21. ^ Cuervo, Rufino José (1914), Apuntaciones críticas sobre el lenguaje bogotano, 6th ed., París: A. & R. Roger y F. Chernoviz, p. 145