rendir

Forms

rendir (first-person singular present rindo, first-person singular preterite rendí, past participle rendido)^[1] The older form render was general in Berceo, the Libro de Alexandre, the Libro de Apolonio and the Poema de Alfonso XI; by the mid-14th century it was probably old-fashioned or dialectal.^[2] Asturian has rindir and Ladino render.^[3][4]

Etymology

It continues inherited from Vulgar Latin *rendere, an alteration of reddō (“to give back, deliver”) under the influence of its opposite prendō (“to take”);^[1] Old Spanish had render before rendir.^[2][5][1] This form already appears as a variant in the Lex Salica.^[2][1] The DLE and Moliner also name vendō (“to sell”) as an influence, and Corominas allows that it may have played a smaller part; he rejects an explanation as a phonetic differentiation of the two ⟨dd⟩.^[2][6][7] The old verb changed its conjugation in the same way as herver, which became hervir.^[2]

The Latin verb lives on in all of western Romance: Portuguese render, Galician render, French rendre and Italian rendere; only Catalan retre and Old Occitan redre lack the ⟨n⟩.^[2][8] The English word render comes from the same Latin source.^[1]

reddō is re- with dō (“to give”); the double ⟨dd⟩ is a remnant of a reduplication lost in the simple verb.^[9][1]

Earliest recorded meaning

The first record is in the Cantar de mio Cid (c. 1140, known from a 14th-century copy), in the old form: si bien las servides, yo vos rendré buen galardón “if you serve them well, I will give you a good reward”.^[10][2] In Berceo the verb is common in render gracias “to give thanks”, as in rendié gracias a Christo “he gave thanks to Christ”.^[10][2]

Semantic evolution

Juan Manuel (c. 1325) already has the modern form, of a falcon forcing a heron to yield.^[2] By the time of Nebrija the sense “to give back” was obsolete and the verb was narrowing to its modern senses: Nebrija lists rendirse el vencido “to surrender”, rendir por rentar “to yield income” and rendir por gomitar “to vomit”.^[2][11] In Spain the sense “to produce, yield” was going out of use in the 16th century, when Juan de Valdés preferred rentar; in the Americas it led to rendir “to go a long way, last” (rice that swells in cooking).^[2][12]

Autoridades defines it as to subdue or conquer, with the change of ⟨e⟩ to ⟨i⟩ in rindo, and Covarrubias's view, which it reports, that the conquered is put back into the victor's hands.^[13] In 1855 Baralt defended rendir gracias and rendir una plaza against the charge of Gallicism.^[14] In Costa Rica, the Andes and the Southern Cone rendir un examen means to sit an exam.^[15][1]

Timeline

• c. 1140 – rendré in the Cantar de mio Cid (14th-century copy).^[10][2]
• 1218–1250 – rendida in the Fuero de Zorita de los Canes, the first record without a later copy.^[10]
• 1256–1300 – the Alfonsine laws use rendir of property that yields more.^[16]
• c. 1325 – the form rendir in Juan Manuel.^[2][5]
• c. 1495 – Nebrija: “to surrender”, “to yield income”, “to vomit”.^[2][17]
• 1550 – the first record from the Americas, in Panama.^[18]
• 1726–1739 – Autoridades: to subdue or conquer.^[13]
• 1884 – the Academy's dictionary gives the etymology “Del lat. reddere”.^[19]

Meanings

Verb

1. (transitive) To force enemy troops, towns or ships to surrender.^[6][1]
2. (transitive, also pronominal) To bring something under someone's power;^[1] rendirse, to give in, yield.^[6][1]
3. (transitive) To give someone what is due to them, or return what they had lost.^[6]
4. (transitive) To produce profit or benefit.^[6][1]
5. (transitive, also pronominal) To tire out, exhaust: La caminata me rindió.^[6][1]
6. (transitive) To vomit.^[6][1]
7. (transitive) With some nouns, to give or pay: rendir homenaje, rendir culto.^[6][1]
8. (military) To hand over a post to another's care; to lower arms or a flag as a mark of respect: rendir la guardia.^[6]
9. (nautical) To reach the end of a tack or voyage;^[15][12] (pronominal) of a mast or yard, to break or split.^[6]
10. (pronominal) To have to accept something.^[6]
11. (intransitive, Latin America) To go a long way, last; to be enough.^[15][12]
12. (transitive, Costa Rica, Andes, Southern Cone) To take an exam.^[15][1]

Word family

• rendición
• rendido
• rendimiento

Related words

• renta
• arrendar
• Latin reddō
• Portuguese render

Usage notes

Rendir is irregular: ⟨e⟩ becomes ⟨i⟩ in rindo, rinde, rinda.^[13][1] Renta is of the same Latin origin, from *rendita, but Corominas holds that it was taken from French or from Catalan or Occitan.^[2][5]

References

1. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q 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, 873
3. ^ Academia de la Llingua Asturiana (2000), Diccionariu de la Llingua Asturiana, Uviéu: ALLA; online at https://mas.academiadelallingua.com/diccionariu, p. s.v. rindir
4. ^ Nehama, Joseph (1977), Dictionnaire du judéo-espagnol, Madrid: CSIC, p. s.v. render
5. ^ a b c Corominas, Joan (1973), Breve diccionario etimológico de la lengua castellana, 3rd ed., Madrid: Gredos, p. s.v. rendir
6. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k 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. rendir
7. ^ Moliner, María (2007), Diccionario de uso del español, 3rd ed., Madrid: Gredos, p. s.v. rendir
8. ^ Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter, p. 7141
9. ^ Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press, p. s.v. reddō
10. ^ a b c d Real Academia Española (2013–), Corpus del Diccionario histórico de la lengua española (CDH), version 3.1, https://apps.rae.es/CNDHE, p. s.v. rendir
11. ^ 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. rendir
12. ^ a b c Malaret, Augusto (1946), Diccionario de americanismos, 3rd ed., Buenos Aires: Emecé, p. 713
13. ^ a b c Real Academia Española (1726–1739), Diccionario de la lengua castellana (Diccionario de Autoridades), 6 vols., Madrid: Francisco del Hierro, p. 5, 572
14. ^ Baralt, Rafael María (1855), Diccionario de galicismos, Madrid: Imprenta de J. Cruzado, p. 604
15. ^ a b c d Asociación de Academias de la Lengua Española (2010), Diccionario de americanismos, Lima: Santillana; online at https://www.asale.org/damer, p. s.v. rendir
16. ^ 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. rendir
17. ^ Nebrija, Antonio de (1513), Vocabulario español-latino, Salamanca, ed. Marina Vidal Díez (2007), Biblioteca Virtual Miguel de Cervantes, p. 408
18. ^ 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. rendir
19. ^ Real Academia Española (1884), Diccionario de la lengua castellana, 12th ed., Madrid: Imprenta de D. Gregorio Hernando (the first Academy edition with etymologies), p. 920