fiero

Forms

fiero (feminine fiera, masculine plural fieros, feminine plural fieras)^[1]

Etymology

It is inherited from Old Spanish fiero, inherited from Latin ferus (“wild, savage”).^[2][3][1] The same Latin word is Portuguese fero, Galician fero, Catalan fer, French fier and Italian fiero.^[4][5][1] The French word, inherited through fer, came to mean “proud”.^[1][5]

The Latin adjective goes back to *xʷeros and Proto-Indo-European *ǵʰweh₁r- (“wild animal”), and is related to Ancient Greek θήρ (thḗr, “wild beast”).^[6][1] De Vaan explains its short vowel by a shortening of the long vowel before a resonant, and the ending it kept by the influence of the feminine noun fera (“wild animal”).^[6][1] Sihler, as Wiktionary reports, takes the adjective as a back-formation from that noun.^[1]

Earliest recorded meaning

The Cantar de mio Cid (c. 1140, in a 14th-century copy) has the word in the senses “wild, harsh, savage” and “extraordinary”: a mountain range is called fiera es e grand “wild and great”, and fiera cosa means “extraordinarily”.^[2][7][8]

Semantic evolution

In the 13th century fiero described beasts that attack and devour others (bestias fieras in Alfonso X's Lapidario), people that are hard and wild, and anything great, excessive or horrible.^[9] The feminine noun fiera “wild beast” is recorded from 1335, and the abstract fiereza from 1220–1250.^[2]

Autoridades gives, besides “cruel”, the senses “very ugly” and “rough, very difficult” of mountains.^[10] The sense “ugly” later fell out of use in Spain but lived on in the Americas: Icazbalceta reports it as a vulgar use in Mexico, Batres as Guatemalan, Román in Chile and Bayo in the River Plate, and the DAMER records it from Guatemala to Bolivia.^{[11][12][13][14]} In Guatemala, Argentina and Uruguay a difficult situation is fiera, and in Bolivia and Argentina fiero is an adverb meaning “a lot”.^[15][14]

As a noun, fieros “threats, bravado” is recorded from 1599, and hacer fieros “to make threats” appears in a Chilean text of 1545.^[2][16] The learned feroz was taken from Latin ferōx in 1438.^[2]

Timeline

• c. 1140 – the Cantar de mio Cid uses fiero for a wild mountain range.^[2][8]
• c. 1230 – Berceo's Vida de San Millán has cuevas fieras “wild caves” full of beasts.^[8]
• 1250–1279 – Alfonso X's Lapidario speaks of lions and other bestias fieras.^[9]
• 1335 – the noun fiera “wild beast” is first recorded.^[2]
• 1545 – first record in the Americas, in Chile: los fieros que nos hacían algunos indios.^[16]
• 1599 – the noun fiero “bravado” is first recorded.^[2]
• 1726–1739 – Autoridades records the senses “cruel”, “very ugly” and “rough”.^[10]
• 1843 – the Academy marks “untamed” of animals as an old sense, and records fieros “bravado”.^[17]
• 1884 – the Academy gives the etymology from Latin ferus.^[18]

Meanings

Adjective

1. Of or relating to wild beasts.^[3]
2. (of an animal) wild, fierce, aggressive: un perro fiero guarda la finca.^[3][1]
3. Hard, harsh or cruel: una mirada fiera.^[3][19]
4. (dated in Spain, Latin America) ugly.^[3][15]
5. Great or excessive;^[19][1] (of pain or feelings) intense: unos celos fieros.^[3][19][1]
6. horrible, terrible.^[3]
7. (Guatemala, River Plate) Of a situation: difficult, complicated.^[15]

Noun

1. (rare, usually in the plural) Bravado and threats meant to frighten someone;^[15] echar or hacer fieros “to bluster”.^[3]

Adverb

1. (Bolivia, Argentina, colloquial) A lot, very much.^[15]

Word family

• fiera
• fiereza

Related words

• fierabrás
• Latin ferus
• French fier

References

1. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h Corominas, Joan (1973), Breve diccionario etimológico de la lengua castellana, 3rd ed., Madrid: Gredos, p. s.v. fiero
3. ^ 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. fiero
4. ^ García de Diego, Vicente (1985), Diccionario etimológico español e hispánico, 2nd ed., Madrid: Espasa-Calpe (1st ed. 1954), p. s.v. ferus
5. ^ a b Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter, p. 3264
6. ^ 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
7. ^ Boggs, R. S.; Kasten, Lloyd; Keniston, Hayward; Richardson, H. B. (1946), Tentative Dictionary of Medieval Spanish, 2 vols., Chapel Hill, N.C., p. 259
8. ^ a b c Real Academia Española (2013–), Corpus del Diccionario histórico de la lengua española (CDH), version 3.1, https://apps.rae.es/CNDHE, p. s.v. fiera
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. fiero
10. ^ a b Real Academia Española (1726–1739), Diccionario de la lengua castellana (Diccionario de Autoridades), 6 vols., Madrid: Francisco del Hierro, p. 3, 747
11. ^ García Icazbalceta, Joaquín (1899), Vocabulario de mexicanismos comprobado con ejemplos y comparado con los de otros países hispano-americanos, México: La Europea, p. s.v. fiero
12. ^ Román, Manuel Antonio (1901–1918), Diccionario de chilenismos y de otras voces y locuciones viciosas, 5 vols., Santiago de Chile: Imprenta de San José, p. 370
13. ^ Bayo, Ciro (1910), Vocabulario criollo-español sud-americano, Madrid: Hernando, p. 94
14. ^ 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. fiero, ra
15. ^ a b c d e Asociación de Academias de la Lengua Española (2010), Diccionario de americanismos, Lima: Santillana; online at https://www.asale.org/damer, p. s.v. fiero
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. fiero
17. ^ Real Academia Española (1843), Diccionario de la lengua castellana, 9th ed., Madrid: Imprenta de D. Francisco María Fernández, p. 342
18. ^ Real Academia Española (1884), Diccionario de la lengua castellana, 12th ed., Madrid: Imprenta de D. Gregorio Hernando (the first Academy edition with etymologies), p. 495
19. ^ a b c Moliner, María (2007), Diccionario de uso del español, 3rd ed., Madrid: Gredos, p. s.v. fiero