pedir

Forms

pedir (first-person singular present pido, first-person singular preterite pedí, past participle pedido)^[1] A popular variant pidir, with old forms such as the future pidré in Juan Ruiz, was widespread; it is still Asturian.^[2][3] The stem vowel changes to i in some forms (pido, pide, pida), as Autoridades already noted.^[4][1]

Etymology

It is inherited from Old Spanish pedir, inherited from Latin petere (“to make for; to seek; to ask for”).^[2][5][6] The change to the third conjugation, which Wiktionary writes as *petīre, is explained by the Latin perfect petīvī and supine petītum.^[2][1]

The verb survives only in Spanish, Portuguese, Sardinian, some southern Italian dialects and Romanian: Portuguese pedir, Galician pedir, Asturian pidir, Sardinian pedire and Romanian peți (“to court a girl”).^[2][7][1] The other Romance languages replaced it with descendants of Latin dēmandāre, or in Tuscan of quaerere;^[8] Corominas counts Catalan among them.^[2]

The Latin verb first meant “to make for, reach out for, move towards”.^[8] De Vaan and Wiktionary trace it to a Proto-Indo-European root meaning “to fly”, Wiktionary's Proto-Indo-European *péth₂eti, with a shift from “fly towards” to “try to reach”; its cognates include Ancient Greek πέτομαι (pétomai, “to fly”).^[8][1] De Vaan notes that this etymology is not self-evident.^[8]

Earliest recorded meaning

The verb is in the Cantar de mio Cid (c. 1140, known from a 14th-century copy), where Martín Antolínez tells the moneylenders that the Cid pedirvos á poco “will ask you for little” for keeping his treasure safe.^[9][2][5] The earliest text with no later copy, the Cortes of León of 1208, has the noun pedidos for a levy.^[9]

Semantic evolution

Pedir has been in general use in every period.^[2] Old Spanish also used it for “to ask (a question)”, as in Juan Ruiz, like French demander and Catalan demanar; the Aragonese author of the false Quijote still wrote pedir de for “to ask after”, and Autoridades (1737) records the sense “to ask, inquire”, which the DLE now marks obsolete.^[2][4][6] In classical Spanish pedir celos meant “to reproach a lover with jealousy”.^[2]

Autoridades also gives “to beg alms” and “to ask for money”.^[4] The Academy's 1884 dictionary adds the seller's “to ask a price”, “to require”, “to desire” and asking a woman's parents for her hand.^[10] In Colombia pedir can be a euphemism for proposing a sexual relationship.^[11]

Timeline

• c. 1140 – first record, in the Cantar de mio Cid.^[2][5]
• 1208 – the Cortes of León use the noun pedido for a levy.^[9]
• c. 1250 – pedido “request”.^[5]
• 1254 – the earliest Alfonsine quotation in the DPCAX has pido “I ask”.^[12]
• 1490 – pedigüeño “always asking for things”.^[5]
• c. 1495 – Nebrija calls it the same as demandar.^[13]
• 1517 – first record in the Americas, in Santo Domingo.^[14]
• 1611 – Covarrubias derives it from Latin petere.^[15]
• 1737 – Autoridades notes the change of e to i in pido, pide.^[4]

Meanings

Verb

1. (transitive) To ask for, request: tell someone of a need or wish so that they may satisfy it: Le pedí un favor a mi vecino.^[6][1]
2. (transitive) To beg for alms.^[6]
3. (transitive) Of a seller, to ask a price for goods.^[6]
4. (transitive) To require, call for: Este trabajo pide paciencia.^[6]
5. (transitive) To want, desire.^[6]
6. (transitive) To ask a woman's parents for her hand in marriage.^[6]
7. (transitive, card games) To oblige a player to follow suit; to call for one or more cards.^[6]
8. (transitive) To order food or goods.^[1]
9. (transitive, obsolete) To ask, inquire; to consent, tolerate.^[6]
10. (intransitive) To pray for someone or something.^[6]

Word family

• pedido
• pedigüeño
• pedimento
• pedidor

Related words

• petición
• apetecer
• competir
• despedir
• Latin petō
• Portuguese pedir

Usage notes

Pedir is the verb for asking for something, while a question is put with preguntar; the older use of pedir for “to ask a question” is obsolete.^[2][6]

References

1. ^ a b c d e f g h Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k Corominas, Joan; Pascual, José A. (1980–1991), Diccionario crítico etimológico castellano e hispánico, 6 vols., Madrid: Gredos, p. 4, 457
3. ^ García de Diego, Vicente (1985), Diccionario etimológico español e hispánico, 2nd ed., Madrid: Espasa-Calpe (1st ed. 1954), p. art. 4975
4. ^ a b c d Real Academia Española (1726–1739), Diccionario de la lengua castellana (Diccionario de Autoridades), 6 vols., Madrid: Francisco del Hierro, p. 5, 181
5. ^ a b c d e Corominas, Joan (1973), Breve diccionario etimológico de la lengua castellana, 3rd ed., Madrid: Gredos, p. s.v. pedir
6. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l 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. pedir
7. ^ Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter, p. 6444
8. ^ a b c d de Vaan, Michiel (2008), Etymological Dictionary of Latin and the other Italic Languages, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 7, Leiden; Boston: Brill
9. ^ a b c Real Academia Española (2013–), Corpus del Diccionario histórico de la lengua española (CDH), version 3.1, https://apps.rae.es/CNDHE, p. s.v. pedir
10. ^ Real Academia Española (1884), Diccionario de la lengua castellana, 12th ed., Madrid: Imprenta de D. Gregorio Hernando (the first Academy edition with etymologies), p. 805
11. ^ Asociación de Academias de la Lengua Española (2010), Diccionario de americanismos, Lima: Santillana; online at https://www.asale.org/damer, p. s.v. pedir
12. ^ 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. pedir
13. ^ Nebrija, Antonio de (1513), Vocabulario español-latino, Salamanca, ed. Marina Vidal Díez (2007), Biblioteca Virtual Miguel de Cervantes, p. 395
14. ^ 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. pedir
15. ^ Covarrubias Orozco, Sebastián de (1611), Tesoro de la lengua castellana o española, Madrid: Luis Sánchez (Biblioteca Wordkers transcription, CC BY 4.0), p. 1202