hervir

Forms

hervir (first-person singular present hiervo, first-person singular preterite herví, past participle hervido)^[1] Old Spanish wrote fervir, with the forms fierve, fierven and feruir in 13th-century texts.^[2][3] The older form with the Latin ending, herver, was Nebrija's preferred form and is still used in Leonese, Cuba and Mexico;^[4][5] Leonese also has jerver, Salamanca jervir and Asturias ferber or ferver.^[4][5]

Etymology

It is inherited from Old Spanish fervir, inherited from Latin fervēre (“to be intensely hot, to boil”).^[4][6][7][1] Latin had both this verb and fervere of the third conjugation, which Corominas calls the more common.^[4] De Vaan finds that the third-conjugation form prevails in the older authors and the second-conjugation one from Virgil on.^[8] Spanish also had a form ending in ⟨-er⟩, but ⟨-ir⟩ won, which Wiktionary attributes to the analogy of servir and vivir.^[4][1]

Among the Romance languages only Portuguese ferver, Galician ferver, Asturian ferver, Romanian fierbe and the dialects of southern Italy kept the verb.^[4][9][5] The others used Latin bulliō (“to bubble, boil”) instead.^[4]

The Latin verb goes back to Proto-Italic *ferweō and to Proto-Indo-European *bʰrewh₁- (“to be hot, to boil”).^[1] De Vaan compares Old Irish berbaid and Welsh berwi, both “to boil”.^[8] Wiktionary relates it also to the English word brew.^[1]

Earliest recorded meaning

Corominas's first record is in Berceo, in the form fervir.^[4] In Berceo's Vida de San Millán (c. 1230, known from an 18th-century copy) the faith that fervié “burned” in the saint's prayer pierces heaven.^[2] The Moamín of 1250 has the physical sense: heat the water fasta … que quiera feruir “until it is about to boil”.^[2]

Semantic evolution

The prose of Alfonso X already uses the verb for a liquid that bubbles from heat, with en for teeming with something (people firuien in sin), for the heat of passions and for things swarming, as worms fieruen in rotting meat.^[3] Covarrubias in 1611 records hervir la olla, hervir de gente and hervir de piojos for a place full of people or a body full of lice.^[10] The Diccionario de Autoridades notes the irregular hiervo, hierva.^[11]

The Academy's dictionary of 1843 adds the stormy sea and the vehemence of passions as figurative senses, and that of 1884 the construction hervir en “to abound in”.^[12][13] Corominas noted that the verb was only intransitive, so that “to boil the milk” was hacer hervir la leche.^[4] The current DLE also lists transitive senses: boiling a liquid, and cooking or sterilising something in boiling water.^[7] In Honduras, Nicaragua and Ecuador it is used of a place swarming with insects or mites.^[14]

Timeline

• c. 1230 – Berceo's Vida de San Millán has fervié, in an 18th-century copy.^[2][4]
• 1240–1250 – the Libro de Alexandre has cauldrons that fierven over the fires of hell.^[2]
• 1250 – the Moamín uses feruir for water coming to the boil.^[2]
• 1250–1279 – Alfonso X's Lapidario uses fierue for powder that bubbles “like water on the fire”.^[3]
• 1492 – Nebrija's Latin–Spanish dictionary glosses Latin verbs with herver.^[15]
• 1570 – the first record from the Americas, in Peru.^[16]
• 1611 – Covarrubias derives it from Latin ferveo and records hervir de gente.^[10]
• 1884 – the Academy's dictionary gives the etymology “Del lat. fervere” and the phrase hervir en.^[13]

Meanings

Verb

1. Of a liquid: to boil, produce bubbles through heat: El caldo ya está hirviendo.^[7][1]
2. Of a liquid: to bubble through fermentation or another cause.^[7]
3. Of the sea: to be very rough, with much noise and foam.^[7]
4. To teem, abound in something: La plaza hervía de turistas.^[7][1]
5. To seethe, be strongly stirred by a passion such as anger.^[7][1]
6. (transitive) To bring a liquid to the boil.^[7]
7. (transitive) To boil something, cook or treat it in a boiling liquid: Hirvió las patatas diez minutos.^[7][17]
8. (Honduras, Nicaragua, Ecuador) Of insects or mites: to be very abundant.^[14]

Word family

• hervidero
• hervido
• hervidor
• hervencia
• herventar
• hirviente

Related words

• hervor
• fervor
• ferviente
• férvido
• efervescente
• fermento
• Latin ferveō
• Portuguese ferver

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 Real Academia Española (2013–), Corpus del Diccionario histórico de la lengua española (CDH), version 3.1, https://apps.rae.es/CNDHE, p. s.v. hervir
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. hervir
4. ^ a b c d e f g h i j Corominas, Joan; Pascual, José A. (1980–1991), Diccionario crítico etimológico castellano e hispánico, 6 vols., Madrid: Gredos, p. 3, 350
5. ^ a b c García de Diego, Vicente (1985), Diccionario etimológico español e hispánico, 2nd ed., Madrid: Espasa-Calpe (1st ed. 1954), p. s.v. fervere
6. ^ Corominas, Joan (1973), Breve diccionario etimológico de la lengua castellana, 3rd ed., Madrid: Gredos, p. s.v. hervir
7. ^ a b c d e f g h i 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. hervir
8. ^ 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
9. ^ Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter
10. ^ 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. 973
11. ^ Real Academia Española (1726–1739), Diccionario de la lengua castellana (Diccionario de Autoridades), 6 vols., Madrid: Francisco del Hierro, p. 4, 148
12. ^ Real Academia Española (1843), Diccionario de la lengua castellana, 9th ed., Madrid: Imprenta de D. Francisco María Fernández, p. 385
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. 563
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. hervir
15. ^ 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. hervir
16. ^ 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. herver
17. ^ Moliner, María (2007), Diccionario de uso del español, 3rd ed., Madrid: Gredos, p. s.v. hervir