generosidad

Forms

generosidad f (plural generosidades)^[1]

Etymology

It is borrowed from Latin generōsitas (“nobility of birth, excellence of stock”),^[2][3][1] first found in the Old Spanish form generosidat in 1293.^[4] Wiktionary gives, as an alternative, from Spanish generoso + -idad.^[1] Corominas treats generoso and the noun as learned words of the family of género.^[5][6]

The Latin noun is formed from generōsus (“noble, of good stock”) with the suffix -tās,^[7][1] and the adjective comes from genus (“birth, lineage, kind”).^[5][8] The same Latin word gave Portuguese generosidade, first recorded in 1660,^[9] Catalan generositat,^[10] French générosité and Italian generosità.^[1]

Earliest recorded meaning

The earliest record is in the Castigos del rey don Sancho IV of 1293, which says of noblemen that death would be better for them than to disgrace their high birth: mas les valdria la muerte que non quando confonden su generosidat.^[4] The sense is the Latin one, nobility of lineage.^[4][11]

Semantic evolution

The sense of liberality is found by the mid-14th century, in a heading of the Crónica de Alfonso X over the king's gift of fifty hundredweight of silver to the empress.^[4] Nebrija still gave the word only for noble lineage, rendering it with Latin generositas,^[12] and a text of 1551 from Santo Domingo speaks of generosidad de sangre “nobility of blood”.^[13]

Autoridades called nobility inherited from one's ancestors the strict sense, and added the virtue of putting honour before profit and self-interest, with a quotation from the Quijote (mostrarás la generosidad de tu ilustre, y noble pecho), and the excellence of things, as of a wine.^[11][14] The Academy added liberality and courage in hard undertakings in its 1843 edition,^[15] and in 1899 defined the liberal sense as largueza, liberalidad.^[16] By 2001 nobility of birth had moved to the last place as a rare sense,^[3] and the current dictionary defines the word simply as the quality of being generoso.^[2]

Timeline

• 1293 – first record, generosidat, in the Castigos del rey don Sancho IV.^[4]
• c. 1340–1350 – the Crónica de Alfonso X uses it for the king's liberality.^[4]
• 1417 – Enrique de Villena uses it in Los doze trabajos de Hércules.^[4]
• c. 1495 – Nebrija glosses it as noble lineage, Latin generositas.^[12][8]
• 1551 – first record from the Americas, in Santo Domingo.^[13]
• 1726–1739 – Autoridades gives nobility of birth as the strict sense and magnanimity as the second.^[11]
• 1843 – the Academy adds liberality and courage in hard undertakings.^[15]
• 1884 – the Academy's dictionary gives the etymology from Latin generositas.^[17]

Meanings

Noun

1. generosity: the quality of being generoso, readiness to give or share without expecting anything in return; liberality: Todos alabaron la generosidad de la familia.^{[2][3][1][18]}
2. (rare) Courage and effort in hard undertakings.^[2][18]
3. (rare) Nobility of birth inherited from one's ancestors.^[3][18]

Related words

• generoso
• género
• Latin generōsitas
• Portuguese generosidade

References

1. ^ a b c d e f g Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d 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. generosidad
3. ^ a b c d Real Academia Española (2001), Diccionario de la lengua española, 22nd ed., Madrid: Espasa-Calpe, p. s.v. generosidad
4. ^ a b c d e f g Real Academia Española (2013–), Corpus del Diccionario histórico de la lengua española (CDH), version 3.1, https://apps.rae.es/CNDHE, p. s.v. generosidad
5. ^ a b Corominas, Joan; Pascual, José A. (1980–1991), Diccionario crítico etimológico castellano e hispánico, 6 vols., Madrid: Gredos, p. 3, 143
6. ^ Corominas, Joan (1973), Breve diccionario etimológico de la lengua castellana, 3rd ed., Madrid: Gredos, p. s.v. género
7. ^ Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
8. ^ 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. generosidad
9. ^ Houaiss, Antônio; Villar, Mauro de Salles (2001), Dicionário Houaiss da língua portuguesa, Rio de Janeiro: Objetiva, p. s.v. generosidade
10. ^ Alcover, Antoni M.; Moll, Francesc de B. (1930–1962), Diccionari català-valencià-balear, 10 vols., Palma de Mallorca: Moll, p. s.v. generositat
11. ^ a b c Real Academia Española (1726–1739), Diccionario de la lengua castellana (Diccionario de Autoridades), 6 vols., Madrid: Francisco del Hierro, p. s.v. generosidad
12. ^ a b Nebrija, Antonio de (1513), Vocabulario español-latino, Salamanca, ed. Marina Vidal Díez (2007), Biblioteca Virtual Miguel de Cervantes, p. 359
13. ^ 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. generosidad
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. s.v. generosidad
15. ^ a b Real Academia Española (1843), Diccionario de la lengua castellana, 9th ed., Madrid: Imprenta de D. Francisco María Fernández, p. 364
16. ^ Real Academia Española (1899), Diccionario de la lengua castellana, 13th ed., Madrid: Imprenta de los Sres. Hernando y Compañía, p. 491
17. ^ Real Academia Española (1884), Diccionario de la lengua castellana, 12th ed., Madrid: Imprenta de D. Gregorio Hernando (the first Academy edition with etymologies), p. 529
18. ^ a b c Moliner, María (2007), Diccionario de uso del español, 3rd ed., Madrid: Gredos, p. s.v. generosidad