poder

Forms

poder (first-person singular present puedo, first-person singular preterite pude, past participle podido)^[1] Old Spanish had the preterite pud, pude, pudo from the start, beside podió and pudió in Berceo; worn-down forms such as puo, pueo and puen appear early, because the verb is used so often as an auxiliary.^[2]

Etymology

It is inherited from Vulgar Latin *potēre, the regular infinitive that spoken Latin built in place of classical Latin posse (“to be able”).^[2][3][1] The DLE says the new infinitive was made on those forms of the old verb that have the stem ⟨pot-⟩, such as the second person singular present and the imperfect.^[4] Corominas explains that the classical conjugation mixed an old simple verb, preserved in Oscan, with a phrase made of potis (“able, master”) and the verb esse (“to be”), later contracted.^[2][5] Spoken Latin kept the participle potēns and the perfect stem of the simple verb, and remade a regular conjugation on them.^[2] Late Latin records show the imperfect ⟨potēbat⟩ at the end of the 2nd century and the infinitive several times in the 6th, and the first person singular is first found in 745.^[1]

All the Romance forms come from this new infinitive: Portuguese poder, Galician poder, Asturian poder, Catalan poder, Occitan poder, Old French pooir (now French pouvoir), Italian potere and Romanian putea.^[6][2][7] Several of them kept present forms going back to the classical ones, whereas Castilian and Portuguese regularised the verb completely.^[2]

De Vaan traces the Latin adjective meaning “able” to Proto-Italic *potis (“master, in control of”) and Proto-Indo-European *pót-i-, the word that also gave Sanskrit and Avestan words for “lord, master”.^[5] The infinitive was used as a noun from the first texts.^[3]

Earliest recorded meaning

The verb and the noun are both found in the Cantar de mio Cid (c. 1140, known from a 14th-century copy).^[3][8] The Cid complains that his goods are too heavy to take away: non puedo traer el aver ca mucho es pesado “I cannot carry the goods, for they are very heavy”.^[8] In the poem the verb means “to be able, to have the power to do or resist something”, “to manage, have the chance” and “to be possible”, and the noun means “possession, keeping” (en so poder) and, in the plural, “military forces”.^[9]

Semantic evolution

The noun took on the senses of authority, of a document giving someone the right to act for another, and of an army's strength.^[10][11] Covarrubias in 1611 defines it as the faculty one person gives another to act in his place, equates it with poderío, and records de poder a poder for a battle in which two whole armies meet.^[12] Autoridades quotes legal texts in which attorneys bring their poderes.^[11]

The Academy's dictionary of 1884 already records the impersonal use puede que “it may be that”.^[13] Political senses such as the executive, legislative and judicial powers are now the chief uses of the noun.^[4] In Guatemala and El Salvador the verb can mean “to annoy, upset someone”.^[14]

Timeline

• c. 1140 – the Cantar de mio Cid uses the verb and the noun.^[3][9]
• 1200 – the derivative poderoso is first recorded.^[3]
• 1250–1279 – Alfonso X's Lapidario uses the noun for dominion and lordship.^[10]
• c. 1280 – poderío is first recorded.^[3]
• 1494 – first record from the Americas, in Santo Domingo.^[15]
• c. 1495 – Nebrija gives Latin potestas, facultas and potentia for the noun.^[16]
• 1611 – Covarrubias records de poder a poder.^[12]
• 1884 – the Academy's dictionary derives the verb from a Late Latin potere.^[13]

Meanings

Verb

1. can, to be able to: to have the power or faculty to do something.^[4][1]
2. To have the time, chance or room to do something, mostly in the negative: Hoy no puedo salir.^[4]
3. (colloquial) To be stronger than someone, to beat them in a fight: Mi hermano me puede.^[4]
4. (with con, in the negative) To bear, stand: No puedo con este ruido.^[4]
5. (impersonal, third person only) To be possible: Puede que nieve esta noche.^[4][13]

Noun

1. power, authority, control over others.^[4][1]
2. The government of a state; supreme authority: tomar el poder.^[4]
3. A proxy or power of attorney, the document that lets someone act for another; often in the plural.^[4][1]
4. possession, keeping: Las llaves están en su poder.^[4][1]
5. Strength, capacity, might.^[4]

Word family

• poderío
• poderoso
• pudiente
• apoderar
• apoderado
• poderdante
• poderhabiente

Related words

• potencia
• potencial
• potentado
• potente
• posible
• imposible
• potestad
• Latin possum
• Portuguese poder

Usage notes

Set phrases include a más no poder and hasta más no poder “as much as possible”, and no poder más “to be exhausted”.^[4] The DLE lists the verb and the noun as separate headwords, but the noun is the infinitive used as a noun.^[4][3]

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 Corominas, Joan; Pascual, José A. (1980–1991), Diccionario crítico etimológico castellano e hispánico, 6 vols., Madrid: Gredos, p. 4, 588
3. ^ a b c d e f g Corominas, Joan (1973), Breve diccionario etimológico de la lengua castellana, 3rd ed., Madrid: Gredos, p. s.v. poder
4. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n 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. poder
5. ^ 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
6. ^ Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter
7. ^ García de Diego, Vicente (1985), Diccionario etimológico español e hispánico, 2nd ed., Madrid: Espasa-Calpe (1st ed. 1954), p. 5181
8. ^ a b Real Academia Española (2013–), Corpus del Diccionario histórico de la lengua española (CDH), version 3.1, https://apps.rae.es/CNDHE, p. s.v. poder
9. ^ a b Menéndez Pidal, Ramón (1908–1911), Cantar de Mio Cid: texto, gramática y vocabulario, 3 vols., Madrid: Bailly-Baillière, p. 391
10. ^ 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. poder
11. ^ a b Real Academia Española (1726–1739), Diccionario de la lengua castellana (Diccionario de Autoridades), 6 vols., Madrid: Francisco del Hierro, p. 5, 308
12. ^ 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. 1220
13. ^ a b c Real Academia Española (1884), Diccionario de la lengua castellana, 12th ed., Madrid: Imprenta de D. Gregorio Hernando (the first Academy edition with etymologies), p. 844
14. ^ Asociación de Academias de la Lengua Española (2010), Diccionario de americanismos, Lima: Santillana; online at https://www.asale.org/damer, p. s.v. poder
15. ^ 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. poder
16. ^ Nebrija, Antonio de (1513), Vocabulario español-latino, Salamanca, ed. Marina Vidal Díez (2007), Biblioteca Virtual Miguel de Cervantes, p. 398