poseer

Forms

poseer (first-person singular present poseo, first-person singular preterite poseí, past participle poseído)^[1] Old Spanish has poseer and posseer beside forms such as posideades, possiades, posseyir and possedido.^[2][3] The spelling posseer was still used by Nebrija, Covarrubias and Autoridades.^[4][5][6]

Etymology

It is inherited from Latin possideō (“to hold, occupy, possess”).^[7][8][9][1] The Latin verb is formed from potis (“able, master of”) and sedeō (“to sit”), and was first used of holding land or property.^[10][11] Gómez de Silva and Vox explain it as “to be seated as master”, a legal term first applied to real estate.^[12][13] De Vaan derives the verb from the root Proto-Indo-European *sed- (“to sit”), and the adjective from a noun *pot-i- (“master, lord”).^[11]

The same Latin verb gave Portuguese possuir, Catalan posseir, Old French posseoir and Old Occitan posezir, and the old texts of Aragon have Aragonese possedir.^[14][9][15]

Earliest recorded meaning

The earliest record in the CDH is a contract of 1244 in which lands are granted que los ayades, é los posseades por siempre “that you may have them and possess them for ever”.^[16] Alfonso X's Libro de las formas (1276–1279) speaks of ways pora auer uillas por fuerça & posseer las “to take towns by force and hold them”.^[3]

Semantic evolution

The verb began as a word of property and law, “to hold, to own”, as Covarrubias still defines it in 1611.^[5] Autoridades adds a transferred sense, “to know something perfectly, such as a language or an art”.^[6] Salvá in 1846 and the Academy in 1869 record the reflexive poseerse “to control oneself, to restrain one's passions”, and the phrase estar poseído “to be filled with an idea or passion”.^[17][18] The Academy's current dictionary adds the possession of a person by an evil spirit or by a passion, and the sense “to have sexual relations with”.^[8]

Timeline

• 1244 – first record in the CDH, in a contract: posseades.^[16]
• 1247 – the Fueros de Aragón use the Aragonese form possedir.^[16]
• 1274 – the BDELC's first date for the verb;^[7][4] DICCA-XV reports 1227 for the CORDE and 1335 for the DCECH.^[7][4]
• 1276–1279 – Alfonso X's Libro de las formas uses posseer of holding towns.^[3]
• c. 1495 – Nebrija gives posseer as Latin possideo;^[4][7] poseedor and posesivo are recorded from the same year.^[4][7]
• 1538 – first record from the Americas, in Lima.^[19]
• 1737 – poseso “possessed”, from the Latin participle possessus.^[7]
• 1846 – Salvá records the reflexive poseerse “to control oneself”.^[17]

Meanings

Verb

1. (transitive) To possess, own, to have something in one's power: Mi abuela poseía tres olivares.^[8][1]
2. (transitive) To have something within oneself or as a part: Este vino posee un aroma intenso.^[8]
3. (transitive, of a passion or idea) To have a strong hold over someone.^[8]
4. (transitive, of an evil spirit) To take hold of a person, keeping them under its will.^[8]
5. (transitive) To know something thoroughly, such as a doctrine or a language.^[8][6]
6. (transitive) To have sexual relations with someone.^[8][1]
7. (law) To hold a thing or exercise a right whether or not one is entitled to it.^[8]
8. (reflexive) To control oneself, to restrain one's impulses and passions.^[20][18]

Word family

• poseedor
• desposeer
• poseído

Related words

• posesión
• posesivo
• posesor
• poseso
• posesorio
• Latin possideo
• Portuguese possuir

Usage notes

The phrase estar poseído means to be filled with an idea or passion.^[8] Beside the participle poseído there is the learned poseso “possessed”, from Latin possessus, recorded from 1737.^[7]

References

1. ^ a b c d e f Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ Diccionario del Español Medieval electrónico (DEMel), data publication 2026 (CC BY-SA), Universität Rostock, p. s.v. poseer
3. ^ a b c 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. poseer
4. ^ a b c d e Lleal, Coloma (dir.), DICCA-XV: Diccionario del castellano del siglo XV en la Corona de Aragón, Barcelona: Universitat de Barcelona, Grup d'Estudis d'Història de la Llengua (GHCL), https://ghcl.ub.edu/diccaxv, p. s.v. poseer
5. ^ 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. 1224
6. ^ a b c Real Academia Española (1726–1739), Diccionario de la lengua castellana (Diccionario de Autoridades), 6 vols., Madrid: Francisco del Hierro, p. 5, 335
7. ^ a b c d e f g Corominas, Joan (1973), Breve diccionario etimológico de la lengua castellana, 3rd ed., Madrid: Gredos, p. s.v. poseer
8. ^ a b c d e f g h i j 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. poseer
9. ^ a b García de Diego, Vicente (1985), Diccionario etimológico español e hispánico, 2nd ed., Madrid: Espasa-Calpe (1st ed. 1954), p. 5170
10. ^ Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
11. ^ 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
12. ^ Gómez de Silva, Guido (1988), Breve diccionario etimológico de la lengua española, México: Fondo de Cultura Económica / El Colegio de México, p. s.v. poseer
13. ^ Battaner Arias, Paz (dir.) (2017), Diccionario general de la lengua española VOX, Barcelona: Larousse Editorial, p. s.v. poseer
14. ^ Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter
15. ^ Cunha, Antônio Geraldo da (2010), Dicionário etimológico da língua portuguesa, 4th ed., Rio de Janeiro: Lexikon, p. 2668
16. ^ 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. poseer
17. ^ a b Salvá, Vicente (1846), Nuevo diccionario de la lengua castellana, París: Librería de Don Vicente Salvá, p. 867
18. ^ a b Real Academia Española (1869), Diccionario de la lengua castellana, 11th ed., Madrid: Imprenta de Don Manuel Rivadeneyra, p. 622
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. poseer
20. ^ Real Academia Española (2001), Diccionario de la lengua española, 22nd ed., Madrid: Espasa-Calpe, p. s.v. poseer