pecado

Forms

pecado m (plural pecados)^[1]

Etymology

It is inherited from Latin peccātum (“error, fault; sin”); Old Spanish pecado, often written peccado in the early texts, already has the modern form.^{[2][1][3][4][5]} The Latin noun is the neuter of the past participle of peccō (“to make a mistake, commit a fault”), used as a noun.^[6][7][8] Corominas considers the verb pecar semi-learned in Spanish, as in all the Romance languages, because its stressed forms never show the diphthong of a popular word.^[9]

The same Latin word is Portuguese pecado, Galician pecado, Asturian pecáu, Catalan pecat, Occitan pecat, French péché, Italian peccato and Romanian păcat.^[10][11][1] It was borrowed as Basque bekatu, general in the Basque dialects and found in Leiçarraga in 1554.^[9][10]

De Vaan rejects the old derivation of the Latin verb from the word for “foot”, and finds Leumann's connection with a root “to fall” better in meaning but hard to explain in form.^[12] Wiktionary still derives it from Proto-Indo-European *ped- (“to walk, fall, stumble”).^[12][1]

Earliest recorded meaning

Corominas's first record is a document of 1107, and the DEMel has it in the Oña charters of the same year.^[9][4] In the Cantar de mio Cid (c. 1140, in a 14th-century copy) a bishop promises the fighters absolution: préndol' yo los pecados e Dios le abrá el alma “I take his sins upon myself and God will have his soul”.^[5]

Semantic evolution

Alfonso X's prose already has the sin against the law of God, anything that departs from what is right, the state of sin and the pecado mortal.^[13] In Old Spanish el pecado was very often the devil, in Berceo, the Libro de Alexandre and Juan Ruiz, whose pecadezno is a little devil; the exclamation ¡mal pecado! meant “alas”, as mal pecado did in Galician-Portuguese poetry.^[9][14]

Covarrubias in 1611 explained peccatum as any deviation from the rightness due to an act, natural or moral.^[15] The Diccionario de Autoridades still gives “devil” as a familiar sense, and the Academy in 1817 records a card game in which going over nine points is a pecado.^[16][17] Today the word is also used, with exaggeration or irony, for a waste or a pity.^[3]

In the Americas the first record is of 1528 in Santo Domingo, and the chroniclers soon use pecado nefando of the sodomy they attributed to the native peoples.^[18] In Honduras pecado de gallo is a jocular name for a hen's egg.^[19] The diminutive pecadillo passed into Italian and French.^[11]

Timeline

• 1107 – the first record, in a charter.^[9][4]
• c. 1140 – the Cantar de mio Cid, in a 14th-century copy.^[5]
• 1218–c. 1250 – sodomitico peccado in the Fuero de Zorita de los Canes.^[5]
• 1256 – Alfonso X's Picatrix promises that seer uos an perdonados uuestros pecados “your sins will be forgiven”.^[13]
• c. 1495 – Nebrija gives Latin peccatum, peccatio and peccatus.^[20]
• 1528 – the first record from the Americas, in Santo Domingo.^[18]
• 1554 – Basque bekatu in Leiçarraga.^[9]
• 1611 – Covarrubias defines it with Thomas Aquinas.^[15]
• 1726–1739 – the Diccionario de Autoridades records the sense “devil”.^[16]
• 1817 – the Academy records the card game pecado.^[17]

Meanings

Noun

1. A sin: a conscious breach of a religious precept: Fue a confesar sus pecados el sábado.^[2][1]
2. Anything that departs from what is right and just, or fails to do what is due; a fault.^[2][16]
3. An excess or a defect of any kind.^[2]
4. A waste or a pity: Sería un pecado tirar este pan.^[3]
5. The state of one who has sinned: vivir en pecado.^[3]
6. A card game in which nine points is the best score and going over nine loses; the act of going over nine in it.^[2]
7. (colloquial) The devil.^[2][3]

Word family

• pecadillo

Related words

• pecar
• pecador
• pecaminoso
• impecable
• empecatado
• Latin peccātum

Usage notes

Common set phrases are pecado mortal, pecado venial, pecado original and pecado capital.^[21][3] Pecado nefando and pecado contra natura were the old names of sodomy.^[3][22] Pecado is also the past participle of pecar.^[23]

References

1. ^ a b c d e f Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f 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. pecado
3. ^ a b c d e f g Moliner, María (2007), Diccionario de uso del español, 3rd ed., Madrid: Gredos, p. s.v. pecado
4. ^ a b c Diccionario del Español Medieval electrónico (DEMel), data publication 2026 (CC BY-SA), Universität Rostock, p. s.v. pecado
5. ^ a b c d Real Academia Española (2013–), Corpus del Diccionario histórico de la lengua española (CDH), version 3.1, https://apps.rae.es/CNDHE, p. s.v. pecado
6. ^ Gómez de Silva, Guido (1988), Breve diccionario etimológico de la lengua española, México: Fondo de Cultura Económica / El Colegio de México, p. 532
7. ^ Bénaben, Michel (2000), Dictionnaire étymologique de l'espagnol, Paris: Ellipses, p. s.v. pecado
8. ^ Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
9. ^ a b c d e f Corominas, Joan; Pascual, José A. (1980–1991), Diccionario crítico etimológico castellano e hispánico, 6 vols., Madrid: Gredos, p. 4, 450
10. ^ a b García de Diego, Vicente (1985), Diccionario etimológico español e hispánico, 2nd ed., Madrid: Espasa-Calpe (1st ed. 1954), p. s.v. peccatum
11. ^ a b Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter, p. s.v. peccatum
12. ^ 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
13. ^ 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. pecado
14. ^ Cejador y Frauca, Julio (1929), Vocabulario medieval castellano, Madrid: Librería y Casa Editorial Hernando, p. 323
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. 1201
16. ^ a b c Real Academia Española (1726–1739), Diccionario de la lengua castellana (Diccionario de Autoridades), 6 vols., Madrid: Francisco del Hierro, p. 5, 174
17. ^ a b Real Academia Española (1817), Diccionario de la lengua castellana, 5th ed., Madrid: Imprenta Real, p. 650
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. pecado
19. ^ Asociación de Academias de la Lengua Española (2010), Diccionario de americanismos, Lima: Santillana; online at https://www.asale.org/damer, p. s.v. pecado
20. ^ Nebrija, Antonio de (1513), Vocabulario español-latino, Salamanca, ed. Marina Vidal Díez (2007), Biblioteca Virtual Miguel de Cervantes, p. 394
21. ^ Battaner Arias, Paz (dir.) (2017), Diccionario general de la lengua española VOX, Barcelona: Larousse Editorial, p. s.v. pecado
22. ^ Real Academia Española (1843), Diccionario de la lengua castellana, 9th ed., Madrid: Imprenta de D. Francisco María Fernández, p. 542
23. ^ Wikcionario (Spanish Wiktionary), es.wiktionary.org