presagio

Forms

presagio m (plural presagios)^[1]

Etymology

It is borrowed from Latin praesāgium (“presentiment, foreboding; prediction”), a learned word.^[2][3][4][1] Corominas notes that Cristóbal de las Casas, in 1570, did not yet list it and translated Italian presagio only as “divination, sign”, and suggests that the word may have come in through Italian.^[2]

The Latin noun is derived from praesāgiō (“to perceive beforehand, foresee”), formed with prae- (“before”) and sāgiō (“to perceive keenly”).^[5][6][7] The OLD instead derives it from the adjective praesāgus (“foreboding”) with the suffix -ium, and considers the simple verb perhaps a back-formation from the compound.^[8] Gómez de Silva traces the root to Proto-Indo-European *sāg- (“to seek”).^[5]

The same Latin word was borrowed as Catalan presagi, first recorded in 1617, and French présage, first recorded in an older spelling around 1390.^[9][7] Segura Munguía also lists the Italian word and the English word presage.^[10]

Earliest recorded meaning

The earliest record in the CDH is the Castilian Libro de Palladio of Ferrer Sayol (1380–1385), which says of the horse that it has grant presagio o adiujnamjento de las batallas “a great foreknowledge or divining of battles”, which ones it will win or lose.^[11] Juan de Mena's Laberinto de fortuna of 1444, the first record for Corominas, uses it for an omen: the night birds make triste presagio “a sad omen” of fights.^[3][2][11]

Semantic evolution

The two senses of the first texts, a sign that announces something and the foreknowledge itself, have lasted to the present.^[11][4] Covarrubias in 1611 defines it as divination, knowledge of things to come, or their meaning through certain signs.^[12] The Diccionario de Autoridades adds that the omen may be favourable or adverse and that it comes from signs or from an inner feeling, and quotes Lope de Vega.^[13] The Academy kept this wording until the 20th century, and first gave the etymology, from Latin, in 1884.^[14][15] Domínguez in 1846 described an omen as a link that a false belief sees between a sign and a future event.^[16] Today the word is usually qualified as good or bad, favourable or adverse.^[17]

From the Latin adjective Spanish took presago “foreboding”, recorded in Cervantes's Galatea of 1584; the Academy still rejected the stress présago in 1843, though it later came to prefer it.^[2] The verb presagiar “to presage” is recorded from 1737.^[3]

Timeline

• 1380–1385 – Ferrer Sayol's Libro de Palladio, the earliest hit in the CDH.^[11]
• 1444 – Juan de Mena's Laberinto de fortuna, the first record according to Corominas.^[3][2]
• 1492 – Nebrija's Latin–Spanish dictionary glosses Latin praesagium with adivinacion, but his Spanish–Latin vocabulary of about 1495 has no entry for the word.^[18]
• 1499 – Fernández de Santaella's Vocabulario eclesiástico explains the word.^[11]
• 1584 – Cervantes uses the adjective presago.^[2]
• 1611 – Covarrubias records the word, from Latin praesagium.^[12][2]
• 1613 – Góngora uses it.^[2]
• 1625 – the first record from the Americas.^[19]
• 1737 – the verb presagiar is first recorded.^[3]
• 1884 – the Academy's dictionary gives the etymology from Latin.^[15]

Meanings

Noun

1. An omen: a sign that points to and announces a coming event: Para los marineros, aquella tormenta era un mal presagio.^[4][1][17]
2. foreboding, presentiment: a kind of divination or knowledge of future things through signs that have been seen, or through intuitions and feelings.^[4][17]

Word family

• presagiar
• presago
• presagioso

Related words

• Latin praesagium
• French présage

References

1. ^ a b c d Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h Corominas, Joan; Pascual, José A. (1980–1991), Diccionario crítico etimológico castellano e hispánico, 6 vols., Madrid: Gredos, p. 4, 643
3. ^ a b c d e Corominas, Joan (1973), Breve diccionario etimológico de la lengua castellana, 3rd ed., Madrid: Gredos, p. s.v. presagio
4. ^ a b c d 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. presagio
5. ^ a b Gómez de Silva, Guido (1988), Breve diccionario etimológico de la lengua española, México: Fondo de Cultura Económica / El Colegio de México, p. s.v. presagio
6. ^ Bénaben, Michel (2000), Dictionnaire étymologique de l'espagnol, Paris: Ellipses, p. s.v. presagio
7. ^ a b Rey, Alain, ed. (1992), Dictionnaire historique de la langue française, Paris: Le Robert
8. ^ Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
9. ^ Coromines, Joan (1980–2001), Diccionari etimològic i complementari de la llengua catalana, 10 vols., Barcelona: Curial / La Caixa (online ed., Institut d'Estudis Catalans 2024), p. 6, 797
10. ^ Segura Munguía, Santiago (2014), Lexicón etimológico y semántico del latín y de las voces actuales que proceden de raíces latinas o griegas, Bilbao: Universidad de Deusto, p. 701
11. ^ a b c d e Real Academia Española (2013–), Corpus del Diccionario histórico de la lengua española (CDH), version 3.1, https://apps.rae.es/CNDHE, p. s.v. presagio
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. 1227
13. ^ Real Academia Española (1726–1739), Diccionario de la lengua castellana (Diccionario de Autoridades), 6 vols., Madrid: Francisco del Hierro, p. 5, 361
14. ^ Real Academia Española (1817), Diccionario de la lengua castellana, 5th ed., Madrid: Imprenta Real, p. 699
15. ^ a b Real Academia Española (1884), Diccionario de la lengua castellana, 12th ed., Madrid: Imprenta de D. Gregorio Hernando (the first Academy edition with etymologies), p. 861
16. ^ Domínguez, Ramón Joaquín (1846–1847), Diccionario nacional o gran diccionario clásico de la lengua española, 2 vols., Madrid: Establecimiento Léxico-Tipográfico de R. J. Domínguez, p. 2, 1418
17. ^ a b c Moliner, María (2007), Diccionario de uso del español, 3rd ed., Madrid: Gredos, p. s.v. presagio
18. ^ 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. presagio
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. presagio