morir

Forms

morir (first-person singular present muero, first-person singular preterite morí, past participle muerto)^[1] Old Spanish also had murir, as in the Cid.^[1][2] The Portuguese-like morrer occurs in the Libro de Alexandre and is still used in Asturias and other Leonese areas.^[3][4]

Etymology

It is inherited from Old Spanish morir, inherited from Vulgar Latin morīre, from the classical deponent Latin morī (“to die”).^[3][5][6][1] Beside the classical form, of the third conjugation, archaic and vulgar Latin had morīrī (in Ennius, Plautus and Ovid) and the active form, found in the capitularies of the Franks and in Venantius Fortunatus; all the Romance forms come from these.^[3] Only a few, such as Sardinian morrere and Portuguese morrer, go back to a form *morēre closer to the classical one.^[3]

The same Latin verb is Galician morrer, Catalan morir, Occitan morir, French mourir, Italian morire and Romanian muri.^[7][1]

The Latin verb goes back to Proto-Indo-European *mr̥yétor (“to die”), from the root *mer- (“to die”).^[1] De Vaan sets up the stem as *mr-ie/o-, beside *mr-ti- (“death”) in mors (“death”).^[8]

Earliest recorded meaning

Corominas dates the verb to the Glosas Silenses, and his short dictionary to the end of the 10th century.^[3][5] In the Cantar de mio Cid (c. 1140, in a 14th-century copy) the hero promises his men enantes que yo muera, algún bien vos pueda far “before I die, may I do you some good”.^[9]

Semantic evolution

Alfonso X's prose uses the verb for the end of life, for the end of a non-living thing, for suffering a passion violently and for a fire or candle going out, the senses the Academy still gives.^[10][6] Covarrubias in 1611 noted the figurative muere por casarse “is dying to marry”.^[11] The pronominal morirse is already in Berceo.^[3]

By an old suppletion found across Romance, muerto served as the past participle of matar “to kill”;^[3][6] Autoridades still distinguished matado (of slaughtering animals) from muerto, but popular speech has since adopted matado generally, and the DLE marks the passive fue muerto as rare.^[3][6]

Timeline

• c. 950–1000 – first record, in the Glosas Silenses.^[3][5]
• c. 1140 – the Cantar de mio Cid has muera and the form murir.^[9][2]
• 1254 – Alfonso X's prose uses muera of a non-living thing.^[10]
• 1526 – first record from the Americas, in Santa Marta.^[12]
• 1611 – Covarrubias derives it from Latin morior.^[11]
• 1884 – the Academy's dictionary gives the etymology, from Latin moriri.^[13]

Meanings

Verb

1. To die, to reach the end of life; also as morirse.^[6][1]
2. Of a thing: to come to an end.^[6][1]
3. (colloquial) To feel a desire or emotion intensely: morirse de miedo, morirse de aburrimiento.^[6]
4. Of a light or fire: to go out.^[6]
5. (colloquial) To long for something or someone: Se muere por ese coche.^[6][1]
6. Of a road or river: to end, to flow into something.^[1]
7. (rare, passive only) To be killed: El ciervo fue muerto de un disparo.^[6]

Related words

• moribundo
• mortal
• muerte
• muerto
• mortaja
• mortecino
• amortiguar
• Latin morior
• Portuguese morrer

Usage notes

Moliner notes that morir, not morirse, is used of a death caused by an accident or violence (murió en un accidente de tráfico).^[14] ¡Muera…! expresses rejection of what is named.^[6] The verb has muero in the stressed forms and the irregular participle muerto.^[15][1]

References

1. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b Menéndez Pidal, Ramón (1908–1911), Cantar de Mio Cid: texto, gramática y vocabulario, 3 vols., Madrid: Bailly-Baillière, p. s.v. morir
3. ^ a b c d e f g h i Corominas, Joan; Pascual, José A. (1980–1991), Diccionario crítico etimológico castellano e hispánico, 6 vols., Madrid: Gredos, p. 4, 149
4. ^ García de Diego, Vicente (1985), Diccionario etimológico español e hispánico, 2nd ed., Madrid: Espasa-Calpe (1st ed. 1954), p. art. 4439
5. ^ a b c Corominas, Joan (1973), Breve diccionario etimológico de la lengua castellana, 3rd ed., Madrid: Gredos, p. s.v. morir
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. morir
7. ^ Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter, p. 5681
8. ^ de Vaan, Michiel (2008), Etymological Dictionary of Latin and the other Italic Languages, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 7, Leiden; Boston: Brill, p. s.v. morior
9. ^ a b Real Academia Española (2013–), Corpus del Diccionario histórico de la lengua española (CDH), version 3.1, https://apps.rae.es/CNDHE, p. s.v. morir
10. ^ 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. morir
11. ^ 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. 1148
12. ^ 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. morir
13. ^ Real Academia Española (1884), Diccionario de la lengua castellana, 12th ed., Madrid: Imprenta de D. Gregorio Hernando (the first Academy edition with etymologies), p. 719
14. ^ Moliner, María (2007), Diccionario de uso del español, 3rd ed., Madrid: Gredos, p. s.v. morir
15. ^ Real Academia Española (1726–1739), Diccionario de la lengua castellana (Diccionario de Autoridades), 6 vols., Madrid: Francisco del Hierro, p. 4, 608