pastor

Forms

pastor m (plural pastores, feminine pastora, feminine plural pastoras)^[1]

Etymology

It is inherited from Old Spanish pastor, inherited from Latin pāstor (“herdsman, shepherd”).^[2][3][4][1] The word was in use from the first texts and is treated by Corominas in his article on pacer.^[2]

The same Latin word is Portuguese pastor, Catalan pastor, Italian pastore and Romanian păstor.^[5][6] French has two descendants: pâtre, from the Latin nominative, and pasteur, from the accusative, which took the religious sense.^[7][8]

The Latin noun is formed from pascō (“to feed, pasture”) with the agent suffix -tor.^[9][1] The verb goes back to Proto-Indo-European *peh₂-s- (“to protect, herd”), the root of Hittite pahš- (“to protect”).^[10]

Earliest recorded meaning

The Cantar de mio Cid (c. 1140) already has the plural pastores.^[2][3][11] The feminine pastora follows in Berceo (1220–1250).^[2][3]

Semantic evolution

The religious sense “bishop, priest with a flock” was already formed in Christian Latin, where pastor meant a bishop, an abbot or a parish priest.^[12][13] Gómez de Silva traces it to the biblical image of the shepherd who cares for souls.^[14] Covarrubias (1611) calls the prelate a shepherd for the spiritual pasture he must give, names Christ the shepherd of shepherds and says that kings are shepherds too.^[15] Alfonso X's Lapidario used el pastor for a star of the constellation Cepheus.^[16]

Autoridades (1737) also records schoolboys' use of pastor for an ink blot on the page.^[17] Today the word also names the Protestant minister, sheepdog breeds such as the pastor alemán “German shepherd”, and in rural Uruguay a stud stallion or boar.^[4][18][12] The Spanish word passed into Tagalog as pastol.^[1]

Timeline

• c. 1140 – the Cantar de mio Cid uses pastores.^[2][3]
• 1220–1250 – Berceo has the feminine pastora.^[3]
• 1250–1279 – Alfonso X's Lapidario uses el pastor for a star of Cepheus.^[16]
• 1495 – the derivative pastoril “pastoral” is first recorded.^[3]
• 1533 – first record in the Americas, in Panama.^[19]
• 1611 – Covarrubias explains the sense “prelate”.^[15]
• 1737 – Autoridades records the shepherd, the prelate and the schoolboys' “ink blot”.^[17]
• 1884 – the Academy gives the etymology, Latin pastor.^[20]

Meanings

Noun

1. A shepherd or herdsman: a person who guards, leads and grazes livestock, especially sheep: El pastor bajó las cabras al valle.^[4][1]
2. A Protestant minister.^[4][18]
3. (religion) A cleric with a flock of faithful in his care, a prelate (prelado).^[4][1]
4. A sheepdog; especially pastor alemán “German shepherd”.^[18][12]
5. (rural Uruguay) A stud stallion or boar.^[4][21]
6. (feminine pastora, Costa Rica) The poinsettia.^[4]
7. (feminine pastora, Cuba, colloquial) Money.^[4]

Word family

• pastorear
• pastoreo
• pastoril

Related words

• pacer
• pastar
• pasto
• pastoral
• Latin pāscō
• French pasteur

Usage notes

El Buen Pastor “the Good Shepherd” is Christ; the Academy's dictionaries from 1817 to 1899 also had el pastor sumo or universal for the Pope.^[4][22][20]

References

1. ^ a b c d e f g Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e Corominas, Joan; Pascual, José A. (1980–1991), Diccionario crítico etimológico castellano e hispánico, 6 vols., Madrid: Gredos, p. 4, 331
3. ^ a b c d e f Corominas, Joan (1973), Breve diccionario etimológico de la lengua castellana, 3rd ed., Madrid: Gredos, p. s.v. pacer
4. ^ a b c d e f g h i 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. pastor
5. ^ Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter
6. ^ García de Diego, Vicente (1985), Diccionario etimológico español e hispánico, 2nd ed., Madrid: Espasa-Calpe (1st ed. 1954), p. 4841
7. ^ Rey, Alain, ed. (1992), Dictionnaire historique de la langue française, Paris: Le Robert
8. ^ Bénaben, Michel (2000), Dictionnaire étymologique de l'espagnol, Paris: Ellipses, p. s.v. pastor
9. ^ Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press, p. s.v. pastor
10. ^ 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. pāscō
11. ^ Menéndez Pidal, Ramón (1908–1911), Cantar de Mio Cid: texto, gramática y vocabulario, 3 vols., Madrid: Bailly-Baillière, p. 379
12. ^ a b c Battaner Arias, Paz (dir.) (2017), Diccionario general de la lengua española VOX, Barcelona: Larousse Editorial, p. s.v. pastor
13. ^ Niermeyer, J. F. (1976), Mediae Latinitatis Lexicon Minus, Leiden: Brill, p. s.v. pastor
14. ^ Gómez de Silva, Guido (1988), Breve diccionario etimológico de la lengua española, México: Fondo de Cultura Económica / El Colegio de México, p. s.v. pastor
15. ^ 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. 1198
16. ^ 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. pastor
17. ^ a b Real Academia Española (1726–1739), Diccionario de la lengua castellana (Diccionario de Autoridades), 6 vols., Madrid: Francisco del Hierro, p. 5, 159
18. ^ a b c Moliner, María (2007), Diccionario de uso del español, 3rd ed., Madrid: Gredos, p. s.v. pastor
19. ^ 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. pastor
20. ^ 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. 799
21. ^ Asociación de Academias de la Lengua Española (2010), Diccionario de americanismos, Lima: Santillana; online at https://www.asale.org/damer, p. s.v. pastor
22. ^ Real Academia Española (1817), Diccionario de la lengua castellana, 5th ed., Madrid: Imprenta Real, p. 647