regulador

Forms

regulador (feminine reguladora, masculine plural reguladores, feminine plural reguladoras)^[1]

Etymology

It is formed from Spanish regular + -dor, with the agent suffix added to the verb meaning “to regulate”.^[1][2] The verb is from Late Latin regulāre (“to lay down rules”), from rēgula (“rule”).^[3][4] Corominas records the verb from Góngora and lists the noun after it, noting its technical sense.^[3][5][4] In 1887 Echegaray compared Catalan regulador, French régulateur and Italian regolatore.^[6]

Earliest recorded meaning

Terreros's dictionary gives the word only in technical uses: a set of parts in the machine for rolling lead into sheets, which raises or lowers the upper cylinder as the lead thins, and, at Toledo, the member of the chapter who counts the votes of a ballot for the notary to announce.^[7] The first record from the Americas, in Lima in 1793, names a device for measuring the flow of water in a channel.^[8]

Semantic evolution

The Academy first entered the word in 1817 as a noun, “one who regulates”.^[9] Its 1884 edition made it an adjective, with a mechanical noun sense: the organ of a machine that matches the driving force to the effect wanted.^[10] In 1899 it became the mechanism that keeps a machine's motion as uniform as possible, and the valve of a locomotive that lets the steam from the boiler into the cylinders.^[11] Alemany in 1917 added a clock that sets the time for the others and a screw that adjusts the pressure in printing presses.^[12]

The DLE now gives the adjective, the mechanism and, in music, the sign shaped like an acute angle that tells the player to grow louder or softer.^[13] Medicine and biology use it for a regulatory gene.^[14]

Timeline

• 1786–1793 – Terreros records technical senses in lead rolling and in the Toledo chapter.^[7]
• 1793 – the first record from the Americas, in Lima, in hydraulics.^[8]
• 1817 – first in the Academy's dictionary, as a noun.^[9]
• 1884 – the Academy gives the adjective and the mechanical sense.^[10]
• 1899 – the steam valve of a locomotive is added.^[11]
• 1917 – Alemany adds the regulator clock and the printing screw.^[12]

Meanings

Adjective

1. regulating, regulatory: that regulates: una norma reguladora del tráfico.^[13][1]

Noun

1. A regulator: a mechanism that sets in order or keeps steady the motion or working of a machine or of one of its parts.^[13][15]
2. A person or body that controls or limits something.^[1]
3. (music) A hairpin: the sign shaped like an acute angle laid on its side that marks a gradual crescendo or diminuendo, according to where its opening points.^[13][15]
4. (biology, medicine) A regulatory gene (gen).^[14]

Related words

• regla
• regular
• regulación
• Latin rēgula

Usage notes

The DLE records the set phrases base reguladora and sueldo regulador, used in calculating pensions and benefits.^[13]

References

1. ^ a b c d e Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ Wikcionario (Spanish Wiktionary), es.wiktionary.org, p. s.v. regulador
3. ^ a b 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. regular
4. ^ a b Corominas, Joan (1973), Breve diccionario etimológico de la lengua castellana, 3rd ed., Madrid: Gredos, p. s.v. regla
5. ^ Corominas, Joan; Pascual, José A. (1980–1991), Diccionario crítico etimológico castellano e hispánico, 6 vols., Madrid: Gredos, p. 4, 900
6. ^ Echegaray, Eduardo de (1887–1889), Diccionario general etimológico de la lengua española, 5 vols., Madrid: José María Faquineto, p. 113
7. ^ a b 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, 323
8. ^ a b 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. regulador
9. ^ a b Real Academia Española (1817), Diccionario de la lengua castellana, 5th ed., Madrid: Imprenta Real, p. 744
10. ^ 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. 914
11. ^ a b Real Academia Española (1899), Diccionario de la lengua castellana, 13th ed., Madrid: Imprenta de los Sres. Hernando y Compañía, p. 857
12. ^ a b Alemany y Bolufer, José (1917), Diccionario de la lengua española, Barcelona: Ramón Sopena, p. 1435
13. ^ 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. regulador
14. ^ 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. regulador
15. ^ a b Moliner, María (2007), Diccionario de uso del español, 3rd ed., Madrid: Gredos, p. s.v. regulador