personaje

Forms

personaje m or (informally when referring to a female) f (plural personajes)^[1] Old Spanish and the classical language wrote personage, the spelling still used by the Diccionario de Autoridades.^[2][3]

Etymology

Wiktionary takes it as borrowed from French personnage, which in French was first a canon-law term for an ecclesiastical dignity and a benefice (1226).^[1][4] The first Spanish sense, in Alfonso X's legal code, is that same benefice.^[5][6] Corominas lists it among the derivatives of persona without saying where it was formed, and García de Diego treats it as a Spanish derivative of that noun.^[7][8] The Academy's dictionaries of 1884 and 1899 derived it from Medieval Latin personaticum, a Medieval Latin word for the office of a parson.^[9][10] The source word is formed from French personne + -age.^[1]

The same word is Catalan personatge, Italian personaggio and Romanian personaj.^[1][11] Latin persona (“mask; character; person”) is of unknown origin: it may come from Etruscan 𐌘𐌄𐌓𐌔𐌖 (φersu, “mask”), or, as Roman writers thought, from personō (“to sound through”).^[1][4]

Earliest recorded meaning

The earliest hits are in Alfonso X's Primera Partida (1256–1263, in a copy of about 1290), where a cleric may be allowed two dignities or personages in one church, and in the General Estoria (c. 1280), which speaks of those who hold the personages in the clergy.^[6][2]

Semantic evolution

The ecclesiastical sense lasted into the 19th century: the Academy's dictionaries of the 19th century still list the benefice, the same as personado, and the DLE keeps it as obsolete.^[12][9][13] In the 15th-century cancioneros personajes are performers who pull false faces when the music fails.^[6][6] The Diccionario de Autoridades gives the sense “person of distinction” and quotes Cervantes and Acosta for a stranger or disguised person and for a figure in a performance.^[3] Terreros records the sense “actor in a play”, and the Academy defined the character of a literary work from 1884.^[14][9] The DLE now adds a person who stands out for an odd way of being, an informal sense Wiktionary also records.^[13][1] In the Dominican Republic it can mean a coarse, vulgar person.^[15]

Timeline

• 1256–1263 – the Primera Partida uses personages for ecclesiastical benefices (in a copy of about 1290).^[6]
• c. 1280 – the General Estoria speaks of personages in the clergy.^[6]
• c. 1445–1456 – Juan de Mena compares false faces with the personajes of a show.^[6]
• 1572 – first record in the Americas, in Mexico City, of painted figures.^[16]
• 1737 – the Diccionario de Autoridades defines it as a person of distinction.^[3]
• 1884 – the Academy defines the character in a literary work.^[9]

Meanings

Noun

1. A personage: a person of distinction or importance in public life.^[13][1]
2. A character in a literary, theatrical or cinematic work: El personaje principal muere al final.^[13][17]
3. (informal) A person who stands out for an eccentric way of being or acting.^[13][1]
4. (obsolete) An ecclesiastical benefice compatible with another.^[13]

Related words

• persona
• personado
• personal
• French personnage

Usage notes

The noun is masculine, but informally it can be feminine when it refers to a woman.^[1]

References

1. ^ a b c d e f g h i j Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b Diccionario del Español Medieval electrónico (DEMel), data publication 2026 (CC BY-SA), Universität Rostock, p. s.v. personaje
3. ^ a b c Real Academia Española (1726–1739), Diccionario de la lengua castellana (Diccionario de Autoridades), 6 vols., Madrid: Francisco del Hierro, p. 5, 235
4. ^ a b Rey, Alain, ed. (1992), Dictionnaire historique de la langue française, Paris: Le Robert
5. ^ 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. personaje
6. ^ a b c d e f g Real Academia Española (2013–), Corpus del Diccionario histórico de la lengua española (CDH), version 3.1, https://apps.rae.es/CNDHE, p. s.v. personaje
7. ^ Corominas, Joan; Pascual, José A. (1980–1991), Diccionario crítico etimológico castellano e hispánico, 6 vols., Madrid: Gredos, p. 4, 502
8. ^ García de Diego, Vicente (1985), Diccionario etimológico español e hispánico, 2nd ed., Madrid: Espasa-Calpe (1st ed. 1954), p. 4964
9. ^ a b c d Real Academia Española (1884), Diccionario de la lengua castellana, 12th ed., Madrid: Imprenta de D. Gregorio Hernando (the first Academy edition with etymologies), p. 821
10. ^ Niermeyer, J. F. (1976), Mediae Latinitatis Lexicon Minus, Leiden: Brill
11. ^ Echegaray, Eduardo de (1887–1889), Diccionario general etimológico de la lengua española, 5 vols., Madrid: José María Faquineto, p. 791
12. ^ Real Academia Española (1869), Diccionario de la lengua castellana, 11th ed., Madrid: Imprenta de Don Manuel Rivadeneyra, p. 598
13. ^ 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. personaje
14. ^ Terreros y Pando, Esteban de (1786–1793), Diccionario castellano con las voces de ciencias y artes y sus correspondientes de las tres lenguas francesa, latina e italiana, 4 vols., Madrid: Viuda de Ibarra, p. 3, 109
15. ^ Academia Dominicana de la Lengua; Instituto Guzmán Ariza de Lexicografía (2024), Diccionario del español dominicano, 2nd ed., online at https://ded.igalex.org, p. s.v. personaje
16. ^ 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. personaje
17. ^ Moliner, María (2007), Diccionario de uso del español, 3rd ed., Madrid: Gredos, p. s.v. personaje