prototipo

Forms

prototipo m (plural prototipos)^[1]

Etymology

It is borrowed from French prototype, according to the DLE and Wiktionary, and the French word is from Late Latin prōtotypos (“elementary or primitive form”).^[2][1] The DHLF dates the French word 1552 and explains the Late Latin noun as the adjective prototypus (“primitive”) used as a noun, with a Greek ending.^[3] The Academy's 2001 edition had derived the Spanish word straight from Greek, and Corominas lists it among the learned compounds of tipo without naming French.^[4][5][6]

The Greek source is Ancient Greek πρωτότυπος (prōtótupos, “original, primitive”), formed from πρωτο- (prōto-, “first”) and τύπος (túpos, “blow, impression, model”).^[2][7]

Earliest recorded meaning

The CDH's earliest hit is in the sermons of Fray Dionisio Vázquez (c. 1530–1539), where Christ the Redeemer is called prototipo nuestro, “our prototype”, the original after which man is modelled.^[8] Covarrubias (1611) spells it prototypo and defines it as the model of something to be made, a building, a temple or another thing, calling it a Greek noun.^[9]

Semantic evolution

In the 16th and 17th centuries the word belonged to religious and learned prose: God or the divine idea as the original of which creatures and images are copies.^[8] Corominas dates it to the early 17th century.^[5][6] Terreros glossed it “first model, pattern, original”.^[10] The Academy defined it from 1817 as the original or first mould from which a figure is made, and added in 1869 the figurative sense “most perfect example and model of a virtue, vice or quality”.^[11][12] The DLE now defines the second sense more neutrally as the most representative model of something.^[2] The modern technical sense, the first unit of a machine built as a model for series production, is defined in the DTME.^[13]

Timeline

• c. 1530–1539 – first record in the CDH, in the sermons of Fray Dionisio Vázquez.^[8]
• 1552 – the French word prototype is first recorded.^[3]
• 1611 – Covarrubias records prototypo as a Greek word.^[9]
• 1716 – first record from the Americas, in Guatemala, of the originals that sacred images represent.^[14]
• 1817 – first in the Academy's dictionary with the modern spelling.^[11]
• 1869 – the Academy adds the figurative sense “perfect model of a quality”.^[12]

Meanings

Noun

1. An original model or first mould from which a figure or other object is made; a prototype, the first unit of a device built to be tested before series production: El equipo presentó el prototipo de un nuevo motor.^[2][13][1]
2. The most representative example of something; a paragon or epitome: Era el prototipo del caballero antiguo.^[2][15][1]

Related words

• tipo
• arquetipo
• French prototype

References

1. ^ a b c d e Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e 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. prototipo
3. ^ a b Rey, Alain, ed. (1992), Dictionnaire historique de la langue française, Paris: Le Robert
4. ^ Real Academia Española (2001), Diccionario de la lengua española, 22nd ed., Madrid: Espasa-Calpe, p. s.v. prototipo
5. ^ a b Corominas, Joan; Pascual, José A. (1980–1991), Diccionario crítico etimológico castellano e hispánico, 6 vols., Madrid: Gredos, p. 5, 504
6. ^ a b Corominas, Joan (1973), Breve diccionario etimológico de la lengua castellana, 3rd ed., Madrid: Gredos, p. s.v. tipo
7. ^ Liddell, Henry George; Scott, Robert; Jones, Henry Stuart (1940), A Greek-English Lexicon, 9th ed., Oxford: Clarendon Press
8. ^ a b c Real Academia Española (2013–), Corpus del Diccionario histórico de la lengua española (CDH), version 3.1, https://apps.rae.es/CNDHE
9. ^ 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. 1233
10. ^ 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, 232
11. ^ a b Real Academia Española (1817), Diccionario de la lengua castellana, 5th ed., Madrid: Imprenta Real, p. 710
12. ^ a b Real Academia Española (1869), Diccionario de la lengua castellana, 11th ed., Madrid: Imprenta de Don Manuel Rivadeneyra, p. 639
13. ^ a b Real Academia Nacional de Medicina (2011), Diccionario de términos médicos, Madrid: Editorial Médica Panamericana; online at https://dtme.ranm.es, p. s.v. prototipo
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. prototipo
15. ^ Moliner, María (2007), Diccionario de uso del español, 3rd ed., Madrid: Gredos, p. s.v. prototipo