mientras

Forms

mientras^[1] Old Spanish had mientre and mientra, beside the longer demientre, demientras and the older domientre.^[2][3][1] Autoridades notes that mientres was said in the past, and Asturian still says mientres and demientres.^[4][5]

Etymology

It is inherited from Old Spanish mientre, later mientras, a shortening of demientre, which goes back to an older domientre.^[2][1] That form is inherited from Late Latin dum interim (“while, meanwhile”), a combination of spoken Latin that joins classical dum (“while”) and interim (“meanwhile”).^[2][6][1][7] The DLE derives the word from mientra with the adverbial ⟨-s⟩.^[8]

Wiktionary and Gómez de Silva explain the ⟨de-⟩ as the influence of the preposition de, and the final ⟨-s⟩ as the ending of other adverbs such as antes, entonces and quizás.^[1][7] Bénaben adds that the ending ⟨-mientre⟩ was helped by the old adverbs of manner such as fuertemientre.^[9]

The same phrase gave Italian mentre (Old Italian domentre), Catalan mentre (Old Catalan dementre), Old French dementres, Old Galician-Portuguese mentres and Galician mentres.^{[6][10][11][3]}

The first word comes from Proto-Italic *dūm, an adverb built on Proto-Indo-European *dweh₂- (“long”); the second is formed from inter (“between”) and an old adverb im of the pronoun is (“that”).^[1][12]

Earliest recorded meaning

The BDELC dates the word to the second half of the 10th century;^[1] García de Diego places mientre in the Glosas de Silos.^[2][3] The first CDH hit is the Cantar de mio Cid (c. 1140, in a 14th-century copy): mientra vós visquiéredes, bien me irá a mí “as long as you live, it will go well with me”.^[13] The first hit not known from a later copy is the Cortes de Benavente of 1202, mientra que la tubiere “for as long as he holds it”.^[13]

Semantic evolution

Thirteenth-century texts mostly use demientre or mientra, and mientras won out over the following centuries.^[1][13] Alfonso X writes mientre for “while”, and tan amientra for “meanwhile”.^[14] Nebrija (1492, 1495) gives mientras and mientras que for Latin dum and quandiu.^[15][16]

The Diccionario de Autoridades calls mientras tanto a phrase of less educated people;^[4] today it is standard.^[8] The correlative mientras más “the more” was first recorded by the Academy in 1884,^[17] and appears in the Americas from the 1530s.^[18] In Mexico, Costa Rica, Peru, Bolivia and elsewhere por mientras means “for the time being”.^[19]

Timeline

• 950–1000 – mientre in the Glosas de Silos.^[2][3]
• c. 1140 – mientra in the Cantar de mio Cid (in a 14th-century copy).^[13]
• 1202 – mientra que in the Cortes de Benavente.^[13]
• 1250–1279 – Alfonso X's Lapidario writes mientre “while”.^[14]
• 1495 – Nebrija gives mientras o mientras que.^[15][16]
• 1533 – mientras más in a letter from Panama.^[18]
• 1734 – Autoridades records mientras tanto as popular usage.^[4]
• 1884 – the Academy's dictionary records mientras más and derives the word from Latin in interea, an etymology corrected to “De mientra” in 1899.^[17][20]

Meanings

Adverb

1. meanwhile, in the meantime: Yo cocino; tú, mientras, pon la mesa.^[8][1]
2. (colloquial, with más or menos) The more, the less: Mientras más corre, más se cansa.^[8][21]

Conjunction

1. while, during the time that (with the indicative): Mientras ella duerme, él lee.^[8][1]
2. As long as (with the subjunctive, expressing a condition): Mientras llueva, no salimos.^[1][22]
3. mientras que: whereas, while on the other hand.^[8][1]

Word family

• mientras que
• mientras tanto

Related words

• entretanto
• Latin dum
• Latin interim
• Italian mentre

Usage notes

Mientras is unstressed as a conjunction and stressed as an adverb, when a pause follows it.^[21] Set phrases are mientras tanto “meanwhile”, mientras que “whereas” and mientras no “until”.^[8][21]

References

1. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e Corominas, Joan (1973), Breve diccionario etimológico de la lengua castellana, 3rd ed., Madrid: Gredos, p. s.v. mientras
3. ^ a b c d García de Diego, Vicente (1985), Diccionario etimológico español e hispánico, 2nd ed., Madrid: Espasa-Calpe (1st ed. 1954), p. art. 2371
4. ^ a b c Real Academia Española (1726–1739), Diccionario de la lengua castellana (Diccionario de Autoridades), 6 vols., Madrid: Francisco del Hierro, p. 4, 565
5. ^ Academia de la Llingua Asturiana (2000), Diccionariu de la Llingua Asturiana, Uviéu: ALLA; online at https://mas.academiadelallingua.com/diccionariu, p. s.v. mientres
6. ^ a b Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter, p. 2794
7. ^ a b Gómez de Silva, Guido (1988), Breve diccionario etimológico de la lengua española, México: Fondo de Cultura Económica / El Colegio de México, p. 462
8. ^ a b c d e f g 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. mientras
9. ^ Bénaben, Michel (2000), Dictionnaire étymologique de l'espagnol, Paris: Ellipses, p. s.v. mientras
10. ^ Nocentini, Alberto; Parenti, Alessandro (2010), l'Etimologico: vocabolario della lingua italiana, Firenze: Le Monnier, p. s.v. mentre
11. ^ Coromines, Joan (1980–2001), Diccionari etimològic i complementari de la llengua catalana, 10 vols., Barcelona: Curial / La Caixa (online ed., Institut d'Estudis Catalans 2024), p. 5, 588
12. ^ Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press, p. s.v. interim
13. ^ a b c d e Real Academia Española (2013–), Corpus del Diccionario histórico de la lengua española (CDH), version 3.1, https://apps.rae.es/CNDHE, p. s.v. mientras
14. ^ 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. mientras
15. ^ 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. mientras
16. ^ a b Nebrija, Antonio de (1513), Vocabulario español-latino, Salamanca, ed. Marina Vidal Díez (2007), Biblioteca Virtual Miguel de Cervantes, p. 380
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. 702
18. ^ 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. mientra
19. ^ Asociación de Academias de la Lengua Española (2010), Diccionario de americanismos, Lima: Santillana; online at https://www.asale.org/damer, p. s.v. mientras
20. ^ Real Academia Española (1899), Diccionario de la lengua castellana, 13th ed., Madrid: Imprenta de los Sres. Hernando y Compañía, p. 659
21. ^ a b c Moliner, María (2007), Diccionario de uso del español, 3rd ed., Madrid: Gredos, p. s.v. mientras
22. ^ Battaner Arias, Paz (dir.) (2017), Diccionario general de la lengua española VOX, Barcelona: Larousse Editorial, p. s.v. mientras