nuestro

Forms

nuestro m sg (possessive, feminine nuestra, masculine plural nuestros, feminine plural nuestras)^[1] Old Spanish also had nueso, nuesa;^[2][3] Covarrubias (1611) attributes nueso, nuesa and nuesamo “our master” to rustic speech.^[2][3] Medieval texts often abbreviate the word nr̃o.^[1]

Etymology

It is inherited from Old Spanish nuestro, inherited from Latin noster (“our”).^[4][5][1][2] The same Latin word is Portuguese nosso, Galician noso, Asturian nuestru, Catalan nostre, French notre, Italian nostro and Romanian nostru.^[6][2][7][8]

noster goes back to Proto-Italic *nosteros, a derivative of the pronoun nōs (“we, us”).^[1][9][4] The suffix is the one of Ancient Greek ἡμέτερος (hēméteros, “our”), and in Latin it marks a contrast between two groups, “ours” as against “yours” or “theirs”.^[10][11] De Vaan reconstructs the Indo-European possessive, with a question mark, as Proto-Indo-European *n̥s-tero-.^[9]

Earliest recorded meaning

Corominas dates the possessive, like the pronoun nos, to about 950.^[4][12] Menéndez Pidal's vocabulary of the Cantar de mio Cid records it both as an adjective and as a pronoun.^[13] In the Lapidario of Alfonso X (1250–1279) the author writes „mas agora tornaremos a nuestra entencion” “but now we shall return to our purpose”.^[14]

Semantic evolution

The plural los nuestros “our people, those of our side” is found in Alfonso X's General estoria (1280).^[14] Autoridades defined the word as what belongs to us for any reason, gave nuestros as “those of the same party, profession or nature as the speaker”, and quoted the proverb nos por lo ajeno, y el diablo por lo nuestro.^[15] Domínguez (1846–1847) added Nuestra Señora, the Catholic title of the Virgin.^[16]

The Academy's dictionary called it an adjective and possessive pronoun in 1843, and in 1884 gave its etymology and explained its agreement: nuestro, nuestra agree with the single thing possessed and refer to two or more possessors.^[17][18] The 2001 edition describes the plural of majesty and the authorial plural, in which a monarch or a writer says nuestro for mi.^[19] The current dictionary adds an affective use before a proper name, and the colloquial la nuestra “our chance”.^[5] Moliner notes that the word is stressed as a pronoun or after the noun and unstressed before it.^[20] In Honduras nuestro amo is the ring finger.^[21]

Timeline

• c. 950 – Corominas's date of first record.^[4]
• c. 1140 – used as adjective and pronoun in the Cantar de mio Cid.^[13]
• 1211 – the earliest record in the HSMS texts.^[22]
• 1280 – los nuestros “our people” in Alfonso X's General estoria.^[14]
• 1611 – Covarrubias notes the rustic forms nueso and nuesa.^[3]
• 1843 – the Academy's dictionary calls it a possessive pronoun.^[17]
• 1884 – the Academy's dictionary first gives the etymology, “Del lat. noster”.^[18]

Meanings

Determiner

1. our, ours: belonging to or relating to us: Nuestro barrio es tranquilo. Esas maletas son nuestras.^[5][1]
2. Used by a writer or speaker for himself, especially in writing (the authorial plural): En nuestro trabajo estudiamos tres casos.^[5][19]
3. Relating to nos, the plural of majesty used by a monarch or prelate.^[5][1]
4. (colloquial) Before a proper name, affectionate or emphatic: Ha vuelto nuestro Andrés.^[5]

Pronoun

1. el nuestro, la nuestra: ours: Vuestro coche es nuevo; el nuestro, no.^[1][20]
2. los nuestros: the people of the same party, family, profession or side as the speaker.^[5][15]
3. la nuestra (colloquial): the chance that favours us: ¡Esta es la nuestra!^[5][20]

Word family

• padrenuestro

Related words

• vuestro
• nos
• nosotros
• Latin noster
• Portuguese nosso

References

1. ^ a b c d e f g h Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d García de Diego, Vicente (1985), Diccionario etimológico español e hispánico, 2nd ed., Madrid: Espasa-Calpe (1st ed. 1954), p. 4619
3. ^ 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. 1168
4. ^ a b c d Corominas, Joan (1973), Breve diccionario etimológico de la lengua castellana, 3rd ed., Madrid: Gredos, p. s.v. nos
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. nuestro
6. ^ Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter, p. s.v. noster
7. ^ Cunha, Antônio Geraldo da (2010), Dicionário etimológico da língua portuguesa, 4th ed., Rio de Janeiro: Lexikon, p. 2349
8. ^ Academia de la Llingua Asturiana (2000), Diccionariu de la Llingua Asturiana, Uviéu: ALLA; online at https://mas.academiadelallingua.com/diccionariu, p. s.v. nuestru
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. ^ Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
11. ^ Rey, Alain, ed. (1992), Dictionnaire historique de la langue française, Paris: Le Robert
12. ^ Segura Munguía, Santiago (2014), Lexicón etimológico y semántico del latín y de las voces actuales que proceden de raíces latinas o griegas, Bilbao: Universidad de Deusto, p. 486
13. ^ a b Menéndez Pidal, Ramón (1908–1911), Cantar de Mio Cid: texto, gramática y vocabulario, 3 vols., Madrid: Bailly-Baillière, p. 362
14. ^ 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. nuestro
15. ^ a b Real Academia Española (1726–1739), Diccionario de la lengua castellana (Diccionario de Autoridades), 6 vols., Madrid: Francisco del Hierro, p. 4, 689
16. ^ Domínguez, Ramón Joaquín (1846–1847), Diccionario nacional o gran diccionario clásico de la lengua española, 2 vols., Madrid: Establecimiento Léxico-Tipográfico de R. J. Domínguez, p. 2, 1265
17. ^ a b Real Academia Española (1843), Diccionario de la lengua castellana, 9th ed., Madrid: Imprenta de D. Francisco María Fernández, p. 502
18. ^ 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. 745
19. ^ a b Real Academia Española (2001), Diccionario de la lengua española, 22nd ed., Madrid: Espasa-Calpe, p. s.v. nuestro
20. ^ a b c Moliner, María (2007), Diccionario de uso del español, 3rd ed., Madrid: Gredos, p. s.v. nuestro
21. ^ Asociación de Academias de la Lengua Española (2010), Diccionario de americanismos, Lima: Santillana; online at https://www.asale.org/damer, p. s.v. nuestro
22. ^ Hispanic Seminary of Medieval Studies (2026), Old Spanish Textual Archive (OSTA): semi-paleographic transcriptions of Old Spanish texts, ed. Francisco Gago Jover et al., https://www.hispanicseminary.org, p. s.v. nuestro