mayo

Forms

mayo m (plural mayos)^[1] Old Spanish texts also have maio, madio and mao.^[2] Mao, in the Libro de Alexandre, is a Leonese variant.^[3]

Etymology

It is inherited from Old Spanish mayo, inherited from Latin Maius (“May”).^[3][4][5][1] Latin used the word short for Maius mensis (“the month of Maia”).^[6][7] The same word is Portuguese maio, Catalan maig, Occitan mai, French mai, Italian maggio and Romanian mai.^[8][9] Goldschmidt compares the consonant of this word with that of poyo from podium.^[10]

The OLD derives the month name probably from an old god Maius, compare the goddess Maia.^[11] It traces the god's name to Proto-Italic *magios, related to magnus (“great”).^[11] Wiktionary takes it from the goddess Maia, whose name may be a Latin formation from Proto-Indo-European *méǵh₂s (“great”), later merged with the Greek Μαῖα (Maîa), mother of Hermes.^[1] Already in Latin the word could be an adjective, as in the phrase for the first day of May, and Corominas thinks that use may have lived on in popular speech, behind the derivative maya.^[3]

Earliest recorded meaning

The DCECH dates the word to the beginnings of the language, with the Cantar de mio Cid.^[3] There it occurs as mes de mayo in the closing lines of Per Abbat's copy (line 3732).^[12] In the CDH an early charter without a later copy is the Fuero de Zorita (1218–c. 1250), which fixes a date “desde entrada de mayo fasta que las miesses sean cogidas” “from the start of May until the harvest is in”.^[13] The Leonese fuero of Villavicencio (1221) writes maio.^[13]

Semantic evolution

From the month the word came to name the May tree.^[8] The REW says the sense “maypole” grew in France out of the spring festivals of 1 May and spread from there to Italy and Spain.^[8] In 1611 Covarrubias described the mayo of the villages as a lopped elm that the young men set up in the square on the first of May, and noted the comparison más largo que mayo for a tall thin person.^[14] Autoridades defined it as a tall tree hung with ribbons and fruit, round which young people danced all through May.^[15] The Academy added the boughs that suitors set at their sweethearts' doors (1817) and, in 1884, the plural mayos for the songs young men sang to unmarried girls on the last night of April.^[16][17] In Zamora the word also named a straw figure on a pole set up to scare birds.^[3]

The month gathered proverbs: Covarrubias has pan para mayo, leña para abril, and the Academy recorded are quien aró, que ya mayo entró “let him plough who has ploughed, for May is here”.^[14][18] In Chile para mayo means “at the Greek calends”, that is, never.^[5][19] In Cuba mayo is also the name of a black-and-yellow songbird, and in Mexico, Colombia and Panama of several plants.^[20][21] Spanish passed the month name to the languages of the Philippines, such as Tagalog Mayo.^[1]

Timeline

• c. 1140 – the Cantar de mio Cid has mes de mayo.^[3][4][12]
• 1221 – the Leonese form maio in the fuero of Villavicencio.^[13]
• 1256 – a text of Alfonso X uses it in astrological prose.^[22]
• 1550 – the first record in the Americas, in New Granada.^[23]
• 1599 – first record of the derivative maya.^[4]
• 1611 – Covarrubias describes the maypole of the villages.^[14]
• 1884 – the Academy's dictionary gives the etymology and the plural sense “May songs”.^[17]

Meanings

Noun

1. May, the fifth month of the year, which has 31 days: Nos casamos en mayo.^[5][1]
2. A maypole: a tall tree or pole hung with ribbons and fruit, set up in a public place for dances and festivities during May.^[5][1]
3. The boy who in some places went with and served the maya, the girl who presided over the May festivities.^[5][1]
4. A bough or bower that a suitor set at his sweetheart's door.^[5][1]
5. (in the plural) The music and songs with which young men serenaded unmarried girls on the last night of April.^[5][1]

Word family

• maya
• mayear

Related words

• Latin Maius
• Portuguese maio
• Catalan maig

Usage notes

Mayo is also the name of an indigenous people of Sonora and Sinaloa in Mexico and of their language, named after the river Mayo.^[24] Set phrases include como agua de mayo “most welcome”, and flores de mayo.^[1][5]

References

1. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ Diccionario del Español Medieval electrónico (DEMel), data publication 2026 (CC BY-SA), Universität Rostock, p. s.v. mayo
3. ^ a b c d e f Corominas, Joan; Pascual, José A. (1980–1991), Diccionario crítico etimológico castellano e hispánico, 6 vols., Madrid: Gredos, p. 3, 890
4. ^ a b c Corominas, Joan (1973), Breve diccionario etimológico de la lengua castellana, 3rd ed., Madrid: Gredos, p. s.v. mayo
5. ^ 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. mayo
6. ^ Battaner Arias, Paz (dir.) (2017), Diccionario general de la lengua española VOX, Barcelona: Larousse Editorial, p. s.v. mayo
7. ^ Bénaben, Michel (2000), Dictionnaire étymologique de l'espagnol, Paris: Ellipses, p. s.v. mayo
8. ^ a b c Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter, p. s.v. majus
9. ^ García de Diego, Vicente (1985), Diccionario etimológico español e hispánico, 2nd ed., Madrid: Espasa-Calpe (1st ed. 1954), p. s.v. maius
10. ^ Goldschmidt, Moritz (1887), Zur Kritik der altgermanischen Elemente im Spanischen, Bonn: Carl Georgi, p. 62
11. ^ a b Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
12. ^ a b Menéndez Pidal, Ramón (1908–1911), Cantar de Mio Cid: texto, gramática y vocabulario, 3 vols., Madrid: Bailly-Baillière, p. s.v. mayo
13. ^ 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. mayo
14. ^ 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. 1103
15. ^ Real Academia Española (1726–1739), Diccionario de la lengua castellana (Diccionario de Autoridades), 6 vols., Madrid: Francisco del Hierro, p. s.v. mayo
16. ^ Real Academia Española (1817), Diccionario de la lengua castellana, 5th ed., Madrid: Imprenta Real, p. 561
17. ^ 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. 687
18. ^ Real Academia Española (1843), Diccionario de la lengua castellana, 9th ed., Madrid: Imprenta de D. Francisco María Fernández, p. 466
19. ^ Malaret, Augusto (1946), Diccionario de americanismos, 3rd ed., Buenos Aires: Emecé, p. 550
20. ^ Alemany y Bolufer, José (1917), Diccionario de la lengua española, Barcelona: Ramón Sopena, p. 1103
21. ^ Asociación de Academias de la Lengua Española (2010), Diccionario de americanismos, Lima: Santillana; online at https://www.asale.org/damer, p. s.v. mayo
22. ^ 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. mayo
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. mayo
24. ^ Santamaría, Francisco J. (1959), Diccionario de mejicanismos, México: Porrúa, p. 708