quitar

Forms

quitar (first-person singular present quito, first-person singular preterite quité, past participle quitado)^[1] Old Spanish had the related adjective quito “free, exempt (from a debt or obligation)”, already three times in the Cid.^[2]

Etymology

Corominas and Pascual take it as semi-learned, inherited from Latin quiētus (“at rest, calm; free from war”), whose sense in legal and religious language was “released from a debt or obligation”.^[2][3] They leave open whether the verb comes from the Late Latin quiētō (“to calm, pacify”), with the two unstressed vowels contracted (so that the adjective quito (“free, exempt”) would be formed from the verb), or whether the adjective comes from the Latin one with an irregular vowel development.^[2][3] The DLE and Wiktionary derive it from Medieval Latin quitō (“to release, discharge”).^[4][1] The Latin adjective already means “free of an obligation” in the Salic Law (6th century) and in the Lombard laws.^[2][5]

Meyer-Lübke, Bloch and Wartburg held that Spanish took the verb from Old French quitier, modern French quitter, and García de Diego also gives the French route.^[6][2][7] Corominas rejects this: a verb so basic is unlikely to be a loan, Spanish has it often in texts of the first half of the 12th century, and the French verb is first found only in the middle of that century.^[2] He sees the word as a native semi-learned form in all the Romance languages of Gaul and Hispania, as in Catalan quiti (“free of an obligation”).^[2] German quitt, Dutch kwijt and the English word quit were borrowed from French after 1200.^[2]

The popular outcomes of the same Latin words are quedo (“quiet, still”) and quedar (“to stay, remain”); quieto is a learned form.^[2][8][7] The Latin adjective is the participle of quiēscō (“to rest”), from quiēs (“rest, quiet”), which goes back to Proto-Indo-European *kʷieh₁-ti- (“rest, peace”).^[9][10]

Earliest recorded meaning

The verb is frequent in the Cantar de mio Cid (c. 1140, known from a 14th-century copy), where Menéndez Pidal counts 17 examples.^[2] There it has the legal sense “to exempt, release from an obligation, tax or debt”: ruegan al rey que los quite desta cort “they ask the king to release them from this court” (v. 2989).^[11][2] With a thing as object it could mean “to pay off”, and it also meant “to free someone from another's power”: quitar vos he los cuerpos “I will set you free”.^[2]

Semantic evolution

From “to free someone from a power” the verb passed to “to take away”, already common in Berceo, where the Virgin complains to a bishop: yo nunca te quité valía de un grano, / e tú me as quitado a mí un capellano “I never took a grain's worth from you, and you have taken a chaplain from me”.^[2][3] The old senses lived on: quitarse “to free oneself” is in the Cid and Berceo, and quitar “to redeem a pledge” is still classical in Cervantes.^[2] In French, by contrast, quitter kept to legal and moral matters until the 16th century, when it began to mean “to take off a garment”.^[2]

Covarrubias derived the verb from a Hebrew kiter “to separate”, and the Diccionario de Autoridades repeated it; the Academy's dictionary of 1884 gave Latin quietare.^[12][13][14] The modern DLE lists fourteen senses, from “to remove” and “to take off clothing” to “to forbid”, “to repeal” and, in fencing, “to parry”.^[4] In Mexico, Central America, the Dominican Republic, Peru and Bolivia quitarse can mean “to undress”, and on La Palma in the Canaries quitar means “to get, obtain”.^[15][16]

Timeline

• c. 1140 – the Cantar de mio Cid uses it for “to exempt” and “to set free”.^[11][3]
• 1202 – the adjective quita “free” appears in the Cortes of Benavente.^[17]
• 1220–1250 – the sense “to take away from someone” is first recorded.^[3]
• 1256–1300 – Alfonso X's laws use it for “to remove” and “to release from a penalty”.^[18]
• 1494 – the first record from the Americas, in Santo Domingo.^[19]
• 1505 – desquitar is first recorded.^[3]
• 1513 – Nebrija's Vocabulario gives Latin adimo, removeo and tollo.^[20]
• 1605 – quitasol is first recorded.^[3]
• 1611 – Covarrubias derives it from Hebrew.^[12]
• 1884 – the Academy's dictionary derives it from Latin quietare.^[14]

Meanings

Verb

1. (transitive) To remove, take something away from other things or from where it was: Quita los libros de la silla.^[4][1]
2. (transitive, also reflexive) To take off a garment, shoe or accessory: Se quitó el abrigo al entrar.^[4][1]
3. (transitive) To redeem something given in pledge or as security.^[4][18]
4. (transitive) To take what belongs to another, to steal: Le quitaron el móvil en el metro.^[4]
5. (transitive) To prevent or hinder.^[4]
6. (transitive) To forbid: Le han quitado los dulces por la diabetes.^[4][21]
7. (transitive) To repeal a law or sentence, or to free someone from a penalty, charge or tax.^[4]
8. (transitive) To abolish a post or office.^[4]
9. (transitive) To stand in the way of, as in the proverb lo cortés no quita lo valiente.^[4][1]
10. (transitive) To deprive of: quitar la vida “to kill”.^[4]
11. (transitive) To release someone from an obligation.^[4]
12. (fencing) To parry a cut or turn aside the opponent's sword.^[4]
13. (reflexive) To give something up: Mi padre se quitó del alcohol.^[4][1]
14. (reflexive) To go away, get out of the way: ¡Quítate de la puerta!^[4][1]

Word family

• quitanza
• quite
• desquitar
• quita
• quitación
• quitaesmalte
• quitamanchas
• quitamiedos
• quitanieves
• quitasol
• desquite

Related words

• quito
• quedar
• quedo
• quieto
• French quitter
• English quit

Usage notes

De quita y pon is said of a part made to be taken off and put back, and al quitar means “short-lived”.^[4] Por un quítame allá esas pajas means “for a trifle”.^[1]

References

1. ^ a b c d e f g h i Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o Corominas, Joan; Pascual, José A. (1980–1991), Diccionario crítico etimológico castellano e hispánico, 6 vols., Madrid: Gredos, p. 4, 735
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. quitar
4. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q 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. quitar
5. ^ Niermeyer, J. F. (1976), Mediae Latinitatis Lexicon Minus, Leiden: Brill, p. s.v. quietus
6. ^ Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter, p. 6958
7. ^ a b García de Diego, Vicente (1985), Diccionario etimológico español e hispánico, 2nd ed., Madrid: Espasa-Calpe (1st ed. 1954), p. 5356
8. ^ Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter, p. 6956
9. ^ Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press, p. s.v. quiētus
10. ^ de Vaan, Michiel (2008), Etymological Dictionary of Latin and the other Italic Languages, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 7, Leiden; Boston: Brill, p. s.v. quiēs
11. ^ a b Menéndez Pidal, Ramón (1908–1911), Cantar de Mio Cid: texto, gramática y vocabulario, 3 vols., Madrid: Bailly-Baillière, p. 409
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. 1242
13. ^ Real Academia Española (1726–1739), Diccionario de la lengua castellana (Diccionario de Autoridades), 6 vols., Madrid: Francisco del Hierro, p. 5, 474
14. ^ 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. 891
15. ^ Asociación de Academias de la Lengua Española (2010), Diccionario de americanismos, Lima: Santillana; online at https://www.asale.org/damer, p. s.v. quitar
16. ^ Academia Canaria de la Lengua (2010), Diccionario básico de canarismos, Santa Cruz de Tenerife; online at https://www.academiacanarialengua.org, p. s.v. quitar
17. ^ Real Academia Española (2013–), Corpus del Diccionario histórico de la lengua española (CDH), version 3.1, https://apps.rae.es/CNDHE, p. s.v. quitar
18. ^ 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. quitar
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. quitar
20. ^ Nebrija, Antonio de (1513), Vocabulario español-latino, Salamanca, ed. Marina Vidal Díez (2007), Biblioteca Virtual Miguel de Cervantes, p. 403
21. ^ Battaner Arias, Paz (dir.) (2017), Diccionario general de la lengua española VOX, Barcelona: Larousse Editorial, p. s.v. quitar