monje

Forms

monje m (plural monjes, feminine monja, feminine plural monjas)^[1] Old Spanish wrote monge (the usual medieval spelling, still the headword of the Diccionario de Autoridades), monje, monie and monche; the feminine moncha occurs in the Fuero Juzgo.^[2][3][4]

Etymology

It is borrowed from Old Occitan monge, which continues Late Latin monicus, a popular variant of monachus (“anchorite, monk”).^[5][6][1][7] Corominas explains the Occitan word as the regular outcome there of the Late Latin form, and the Spanish one as taken over from Occitan.^[5] Bénaben and the DLE also derive it through Old Occitan.^[8][6] García de Diego allows Occitan or Catalan as the source.^[3]

A native Castilian form also existed: Old Spanish mónago, which survives in the derivatives monaguillo and the 13th-century monaguesa (“a cleric's concubine”).^[5][8][9] Beside it stand Portuguese monge, Galician monxe and Catalan monjo, and further afield Italian monaco and Old French monie.^[9][1][3]

The Latin noun is from Ancient Greek μοναχός (monakhós, “single, solitary”), from μόνος (mónos, “alone”).^[1][10] In Greek it was first an adjective, and only later came to mean a monk; in Latin it is a word of Church writers, used both of the solitary hermit and of the monk living in a community.^[7][11][10]

Earliest recorded meaning

Corominas dates the word to 1131.^[5] The DEMel lists Monge in documents of the reconquest of the Ebro valley from 1135.^[2] In Alfonso X's Siete Partidas (1256–1300) the word still has its first sense, “a solitary, an anchorite”: the text explains that monge means in Greek one who keeps himself apart, and in Latin “one alone and sad”.^[12]

Semantic evolution

Alfonso X's Estoria de España (1270–1284) already uses the word for a member of a religious order living in a monastery.^[12] The Diccionario de Autoridades still gave “solitary, anchorite” first and added that the name was now also given to the religious of the monastic orders, black and white: the Basilians, Benedictines, Bernardines, Hieronymites and Carthusians.^[4] The Academy still put the anchorite first in 1899; today the DLE puts the member of an order first and the anchorite second.^[13][6]

The feminine monja, recorded from 1200, is the usual word for a nun.^[5][6] From the 1843 edition the Academy also gave monje as the name of a bird, the great tit (paro carbonero).^[14][15][6] The plural monjas is also the sparks that linger on burnt paper.^[6] In the Americas the word is recorded from 1531, in Santo Domingo.^[16]

Timeline

• 1131 – first record of monje.^[5]
• 1135 – Monge in documents of the reconquest of the Ebro valley.^[2]
• 1200 – first record of the feminine monja.^[5]
• 1256–1300 – the Siete Partidas explain monge as “solitary”.^[12]
• 1531 – first record from the Americas, Santo Domingo: monges gerónimos.^[16]
• 1611 – first record of the diminutive monaguillo (earlier monacillo).^[5]
• 1726–1739 – the Diccionario de Autoridades, under Monge, gives “solitary, anchorite” and the monks of the monastic orders.^[4]
• 1843 – the Academy adds the sense of a bird.^[14]
• 1884 – the Academy's dictionary gives the etymology “Del lat. monachus”.^[17]

Meanings

Noun

1. A monk: a member of a religious order (orden) who lives in a monastery (monasterio) (the feminine monja is a nun): Los monjes se levantan antes del alba para rezar.^[6][18][1]
2. An anchorite (anacoreta), a hermit living alone in prayer and penance.^[6][18]
3. (zoology) The great tit (paro carbonero).^[6][18]
4. (feminine plural, monjas) The glowing sparks left in paper that has been burnt, which go out one by one.^[6]

Word family

• monja
• monjil
• monjío
• monaguillo

Related words

• monacal
• monástico
• Latin monachus
• Portuguese monge

Usage notes

The proverb el hábito no hace al monje “the habit does not make the monk” is current.^[18] In Guatemala monja blanca is an orchid, the national flower.^[6]

References

1. ^ a b c d e f Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c Diccionario del Español Medieval electrónico (DEMel), data publication 2026 (CC BY-SA), Universität Rostock, p. s.v. monje
3. ^ a b c García de Diego, Vicente (1985), Diccionario etimológico español e hispánico, 2nd ed., Madrid: Espasa-Calpe (1st ed. 1954), p. 4419
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, 597
5. ^ a b c d e f g h Corominas, Joan (1973), Breve diccionario etimológico de la lengua castellana, 3rd ed., Madrid: Gredos, p. s.v. monje
6. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k 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. monje
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. 470
8. ^ a b Bénaben, Michel (2000), Dictionnaire étymologique de l'espagnol, Paris: Ellipses, p. s.v. monje
9. ^ a b Segura Munguía, Santiago (2001), Nuevo diccionario etimológico latín-español y de las voces derivadas, Bilbao: Universidad de Deusto, p. 471
10. ^ a b Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press, p. s.v. monachus
11. ^ Niermeyer, J. F. (1976), Mediae Latinitatis Lexicon Minus, Leiden: Brill, p. s.v. monachus
12. ^ 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. monje
13. ^ Real Academia Española (1899), Diccionario de la lengua castellana, 13th ed., Madrid: Imprenta de los Sres. Hernando y Compañía, p. 670
14. ^ a b Real Academia Española (1843), Diccionario de la lengua castellana, 9th ed., Madrid: Imprenta de D. Francisco María Fernández, p. 483
15. ^ Alemany y Bolufer, José (1917), Diccionario de la lengua española, Barcelona: Ramón Sopena, p. 1158
16. ^ 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. monje
17. ^ Real Academia Española (1884), Diccionario de la lengua castellana, 12th ed., Madrid: Imprenta de D. Gregorio Hernando (the first Academy edition with etymologies), p. 715
18. ^ a b c d Moliner, María (2007), Diccionario de uso del español, 3rd ed., Madrid: Gredos, p. s.v. monje