hacienda

Forms

hacienda f (plural haciendas)^[1] Old Spanish wrote fazienda and facienda;^[2] Alfonso X's prose also has fazenda.^[2][3]

Etymology

It is inherited from Latin facienda (“things to be done”), the neuter plural of the gerundive of faciō (“to do, make”), through Old Spanish fazienda.^[4][5][6][1] The change of Latin /f/ to Spanish ⟨h⟩ is the same as in hacer and hablar.^[7] Etymonline traces the Latin verb to Proto-Indo-European *dʰeh₁- (“to set, put”).^[7]

The same Latin word is Portuguese fazenda and Galician facenda.^[8][1][9] faena “task” is a doublet, taken from Catalan faena, and fachenda “show of business” comes from Italian faccenda.^[8][1] Spanish lent the word to Italian azienda, Catalan hisenda and English hacienda.^[4][5][7]

Earliest recorded meaning

Corominas records the word, spelt with f-, in a charter of 1115 in Oelschläger's list.^[4][5] In Berceo's Milagros de Nuestra Señora it means “affairs, business”, and also a person's “condition” and “standing”.^[4][2] In Alfonso X's Lapidario (1250–1279) it already means “one's goods and wealth”: a stone that makes the bearer lose „toda su facienda”.^[3]

Semantic evolution

From “matters to be done” the word passed to “affairs”, then to “goods, wealth”; from there it went on, on one side, to the management of goods, in particular those of the State, and on the other to “cattle, livestock”.^[4][5] The original sense “work, task” survived: Juan Ruiz uses it for “battle”, Guzmán de Alfarache for “chores”, and Cervantes for household work.^[4][10] Covarrubias (1611) explains it as what a worker gains by working, and calls a woman who never sits idle hazendosa.^[11]

The Diccionario de Autoridades gave first the sense “farmland, estate”, then “wealth” and “household chores”.^[12] The Academy's 1884 dictionary added the Ministry of Finance, the public revenues and the Mexican hacienda de beneficio, a works where silver ore was processed.^[13] The sense “cattle” is Rioplatense, Chilean, Venezuelan and Panamanian, and is also used in Salamanca, Palencia and Sanabria.^[4][14][15] In Cuba it named a cattle ranch, and in Puerto Rico the building of a sugar mill that houses the machinery.^[16][17] In Mexico a hacienda is a larger estate than a rancho.^[18] English borrowed the American Spanish word in 1760 for a country estate or ranch.^[7]

Timeline

• 1115 – the first record, in a charter (with f-).^[4][5]
• 1220–1250 – Berceo uses it for “affairs, business” and a person's standing.^[5][4]
• 1250–1279 – Alfonso X's Lapidario uses facienda for “goods, wealth”.^[3]
• 1519 – the first records from the Americas, in Panama and Puerto Rico.^[19]
• 1605 – the derivative hacendoso “hard-working” is first recorded.^[5]
• 1611 – Covarrubias writes the word hazienda.^[11]
• 1726–1739 – the Diccionario de Autoridades defines it first as farmland.^[12]
• 1760 – English borrows hacienda from American Spanish.^[7]
• 1884 – the Academy adds the Ministry of Finance and the Mexican hacienda de beneficio.^[13]
• 1917 – Alemany records the Argentine sense “cattle”.^[20]

Meanings

Noun

1. An agricultural estate, a large farm or ranch.^[6][21][1]
2. The goods and wealth someone owns: perdió toda su hacienda en el juego.^[6][22]
3. (often capitalised) The public treasury: the revenues and property of the State (hacienda pública), and the government department that draws up the budget and collects taxes: el Ministerio de Hacienda.^[6][1]
4. The livestock of an owner or a farm;^[21][1] (Argentina) cattle.^[6][21][1]
5. (rare, usually in the plural) Household chores.^[6]
6. (Puerto Rico) In a sugar mill, the building that houses the machinery.^[23][17]
7. (obsolete) A deed or event; a matter dealt with between people.^[6]

Word family

• hacendario
• hacendera
• hacendero
• haciendero
• hacendado
• hacendoso
• hacendista

Related words

• hacendar
• hacer
• faena
• Latin facienda
• Portuguese fazenda

Usage notes

Hacienda de beneficio is a Mexican term for a works where silver ore is processed.^[6] The proverb hacienda, tu dueño te vea warns that property left to others' care suffers.^[24]

References

1. ^ a b c d e f g h i Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c Boggs, R. S.; Kasten, Lloyd; Keniston, Hayward; Richardson, H. B. (1946), Tentative Dictionary of Medieval Spanish, 2 vols., Chapel Hill, N.C., p. 253
3. ^ 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. hacienda
4. ^ 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. 3, 297
5. ^ a b c d e f g Corominas, Joan (1973), Breve diccionario etimológico de la lengua castellana, 3rd ed., Madrid: Gredos, p. s.v. hacer
6. ^ a b c d e f g h Real Academia Española (2001), Diccionario de la lengua española, 22nd ed., Madrid: Espasa-Calpe, p. s.v. hacienda
7. ^ a b c d e Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
8. ^ a b García de Diego, Vicente (1985), Diccionario etimológico español e hispánico, 2nd ed., Madrid: Espasa-Calpe (1st ed. 1954), p. 2630
9. ^ Cunha, Antônio Geraldo da (2010), Dicionário etimológico da língua portuguesa, 4th ed., Rio de Janeiro: Lexikon, p. 1535
10. ^ 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. hacienda
11. ^ 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. 966
12. ^ a b Real Academia Española (1726–1739), Diccionario de la lengua castellana (Diccionario de Autoridades), 6 vols., Madrid: Francisco del Hierro, p. 4, 120
13. ^ 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. 554
14. ^ Granada, Daniel (1890), Vocabulario rioplatense razonado, 2nd ed., Montevideo: Imprenta Rural, p. 236
15. ^ Lamano y Beneite, José de (1915), El dialecto vulgar salmantino, Salamanca: Tipografía Popular, p. 484
16. ^ Pichardo, Esteban (1875), Diccionario provincial casi-razonado de vozes y frases cubanas, 4th ed., La Habana: Imprenta El Trabajo, p. 189
17. ^ a b Malaret, Augusto (1946), Diccionario de americanismos, 3rd ed., Buenos Aires: Emecé, p. 464
18. ^ Santamaría, Francisco J. (1959), Diccionario de mejicanismos, México: Porrúa, p. 590
19. ^ 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. facienda
20. ^ Alemany y Bolufer, José (1917), Diccionario de la lengua española, Barcelona: Ramón Sopena, p. 870
21. ^ a b c Asociación de Academias de la Lengua Española (2010), Diccionario de americanismos, Lima: Santillana; online at https://www.asale.org/damer, p. s.v. hacienda
22. ^ Moliner, María (2007), Diccionario de uso del español, 3rd ed., Madrid: Gredos, p. s.v. hacienda
23. ^ Academia Puertorriqueña de la Lengua Española; Universidad de Puerto Rico, Tesoro lexicográfico del español de Puerto Rico, https://tesoro.pr, p. s.v. hacienda
24. ^ Real Academia Española (1843), Diccionario de la lengua castellana, 9th ed., Madrid: Imprenta de D. Francisco María Fernández, p. 379