maduro

Forms

maduro (feminine madura, masculine plural maduros, feminine plural maduras)^[1] Andalusian and Murcian speech has mauro, and the Canary Islands maúro.^[2][3]

Etymology

It is inherited from Old Spanish maduro, inherited from Latin mātūrus (“ripe; timely”).^[4][5][6][1] The same Latin word is Portuguese maduro, Galician maduro, Asturian maduru, Catalan madur, Occitan madur, French mûr and Italian maturo.^[7][2][8] Pyrenean speech keeps the /t/ in Aragonese maturo and matur.^[2]

The Latin adjective and mātūtīnus (“of the early morning”) both presuppose a noun Proto-Italic *mātu- (“ripeness, early moment”), from Proto-Indo-European *meh₂-tu- (“ripeness”).^[9][1] De Vaan thinks the root is probably the same as in mānus (“good”), and Wiktionary also compares mānē (“early in the morning”).^[9][1]

Earliest recorded meaning

Corominas's first record is in Berceo, and the word is also in Don Juan Manuel and Juan Ruiz.^[4] The DEMel cites a vocabulary of the Vida de Santa María Egipciaca (c. 1215–1220).^[10] The first sense is the ripeness of fruit: Alfonso X's Lapidario tells of fruits that hang from trees and desque son maduras caen “fall once they are ripe”.^[11]

Semantic evolution

Covarrubias in 1611 calls hombre maduro the prudent man who knows from age and experience what to do, and gives the proverb quien come las maduras, coma las duras “who eats the ripe ones should eat the hard ones too”, that is, who takes the profit should take the pains.^[12] The Diccionario de Autoridades has three senses: ripe, prudent, and advanced in age.^[13] The Academy's dictionary of 1843 had only the first two, and that of 1869 added “getting on in years”.^[14][15] The modern dictionaries add a sense of plans and situations, ready to be acted on.^[6][16]

In much of Latin America maduro is a noun for the ripe plantain, recorded by Alemany for Colombia in 1917.^[17][18] Other American senses are “infected” of a wound in Nicaragua and El Salvador, “sore, battered” in Central America and Cuba, and “slightly drunk” in Cuba.^[6][17][19] In the Canary Islands maduro or maúro is a country person, and by extension a boor.^[20][3][21] English borrowed the word as maduro.^[1]

Timeline

• c. 1215–1220 – a record in the Vida de Santa María Egipciaca, cited by the DEMel.^[10][22]
• 1220–1250 – Berceo, Corominas's first record.^[4][5]
• 1250–1279 – Alfonso X's Lapidario uses it of ripe fruit.^[11]
• 1335 – the verb madurar.^[5]
• 1490 – the noun madurez.^[5]
• 1568 – first record in the Americas, at Guatemala: muy maduro consejo.^[23]
• 1591 – Percyvall glosses it “mellow”.^[24]
• 1611 – Covarrubias records the proverb quien come las maduras, coma las duras.^[12]
• 1869 – the Academy adds the sense “getting on in years”.^[15]
• 1884 – the Academy gives the etymology from Latin maturus.^[25]
• 1917 – Alemany records the noun “ripe plantain” in Colombia.^[18]

Meanings

Adjective

1. Of fruit: ripe, grown enough to be eaten.^[6][1]
2. Of a person or thing: developed enough to be used or to work: El proyecto todavía no está maduro.^[6]
3. Mature: with the judgement of an adult: Es una chica muy madura para su edad.^[6][1]
4. Of a person: no longer young but not yet old, middle-aged.^[6][1]
5. (Nicaragua, El Salvador) Of a wound or a pimple: infected.^[6][17]
6. (Cuba) Slightly drunk.^[17]

Noun

1. (Bolivia, Colombia, Ecuador and elsewhere in Latin America) A ripe plantain.^[6][1][17]

Word family

• madurez
• madurar
• maduración

Related words

• prematuro
• inmaturo
• matutino
• mañana

Usage notes

The phrase a las duras y a las maduras, “in good times and bad”, continues the old proverb of the ripe and the hard fruit.^[1][12] Edad madura is the age between youth and old age, and tabaco maduro a dark, well-cured tobacco.^[6][18]

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 García de Diego, Vicente (1985), Diccionario etimológico español e hispánico, 2nd ed., Madrid: Espasa-Calpe (1st ed. 1954), p. 4218
3. ^ a b Millares Cubas, Luis; Millares Cubas, Agustín (1922), Cómo hablan los canarios: refundición del Léxico de Gran Canaria, Las Palmas, p. 100
4. ^ a b c Corominas, Joan; Pascual, José A. (1980–1991), Diccionario crítico etimológico castellano e hispánico, 6 vols., Madrid: Gredos, p. 3, 760
5. ^ a b c d Corominas, Joan (1973), Breve diccionario etimológico de la lengua castellana, 3rd ed., Madrid: Gredos, p. s.v. maduro
6. ^ a b c d e f g h i j 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. maduro
7. ^ Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter, p. 5433
8. ^ Academia de la Llingua Asturiana (2000), Diccionariu de la Llingua Asturiana, Uviéu: ALLA; online at https://mas.academiadelallingua.com/diccionariu, p. s.v. maduru
9. ^ 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
10. ^ a b Diccionario del Español Medieval electrónico (DEMel), data publication 2026 (CC BY-SA), Universität Rostock, p. s.v. maduro
11. ^ 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. maduro
12. ^ a b c Covarrubias Orozco, Sebastián de (1611), Tesoro de la lengua castellana o española, Madrid: Luis Sánchez (Biblioteca Wordkers transcription, CC BY 4.0), p. 1101
13. ^ Real Academia Española (1726–1739), Diccionario de la lengua castellana (Diccionario de Autoridades), 6 vols., Madrid: Francisco del Hierro, p. 4, 452
14. ^ Real Academia Española (1843), Diccionario de la lengua castellana, 9th ed., Madrid: Imprenta de D. Francisco María Fernández, p. 449
15. ^ a b Real Academia Española (1869), Diccionario de la lengua castellana, 11th ed., Madrid: Imprenta de Don Manuel Rivadeneyra, p. 478
16. ^ Moliner, María (2007), Diccionario de uso del español, 3rd ed., Madrid: Gredos, p. s.v. maduro
17. ^ 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. maduro
18. ^ a b c Alemany y Bolufer, José (1917), Diccionario de la lengua española, Barcelona: Ramón Sopena, p. 1062
19. ^ Santamaría, Francisco J. (1942), Diccionario general de americanismos, 3 vols., México: Pedro Robredo, p. 212
20. ^ Maffiotte, Luis (1993), Los canarismos (manuscript c. 1887), ed. Lothar Siemens Hernández, Las Palmas: Instituto de Estudios Canarios, p. 94
21. ^ Real Academia Española (2021–), Tesoro de los diccionarios históricos de la lengua española (TDHLE): Diccionario histórico (1933–1936), its unpublished slips, Diccionario histórico (1960–1996), DHECan, DHECR, DHEVen, https://www.rae.es/tdhle, p. s.v. maduro
22. ^ Real Academia Nacional de Medicina (2011), Diccionario de términos médicos, Madrid: Editorial Médica Panamericana; online at https://dtme.ranm.es, p. s.v. maduro
23. ^ 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. maduro
24. ^ Percyvall, Richard (1591), Bibliothecae Hispanicae pars altera: containing a dictionarie in Spanish, English and Latine, London: John Jackson for Richard Watkins, p. 166
25. ^ Real Academia Española (1884), Diccionario de la lengua castellana, 12th ed., Madrid: Imprenta de D. Gregorio Hernando (the first Academy edition with etymologies), p. 661