responder

Forms

responder (first-person singular present respondo, first-person singular preterite respondí, past participle respondido)^[1] Old Spanish had a strong preterite respuso, found in Elena y María and the Libro de Alexandre and still used by Santillana; it later became repuso by dissimilation, as escuspir became escupir.^[2][3] The old participle respuesto “answered” was still used in Alfonso X's Espéculo but soon went out of use.^[2] Asturian has the diphthong in the stressed forms: respuendo, respuende.^[1][4]

Etymology

It continues inherited from Old Spanish responder, inherited from Latin respondeō (“to answer, reply”).^[2][3][5][1] Wiktionary thinks it came through Late Latin respondĕre, of the third conjugation, a change of verb class attested in the Mulomedicina Chironis, a Late Latin veterinary text.^[1] The present ⟨responde⟩ has /o/ from the earliest texts, not the diphthong /we/: Corominas puts this down to the closing of the vowel before the following nasal, as in esconder.^[2] The diphthong is found in Asturian and now and then in Old Spanish.^[1]

The same Latin verb is Portuguese responder, Galician responder, Asturian responder, Catalan respondre, French répondre, Italian rispondere and Romanian răspunde.^[6][7][1]

respondeō is formed with re- (“back, in return”) and spondeō (“to pledge, promise”).^[1][8] The Oxford Latin Dictionary thinks it was at first a legal term, used of the solemn promise called spōnsiō.^[8] De Vaan traces spondeō to *spondejō (“to libate many times”), which came to mean “to pledge”, and further to *spondeye- (“to libate”).^[9] Wiktionary derives it from Proto-Indo-European *spend- (“to perform a rite, make an offering”), the root of Ancient Greek σπένδω (spéndō, “to pour a libation”).^[1]

Earliest recorded meaning

Corominas dates the verb to a charter of 1022 in Oelschläger's list, and then to the Cantar de mio Cid.^[2][3] In the Cid (c. 1140, known from a 14th-century copy) it already means “to answer”: „Respondió el rey: — Afé aquí Álbar Fáñez” “the king answered: here is Álvar Fáñez”.^[10] The first hit in a text without a later copy, the Cortes of León of 1208, uses it in the legal sense “to answer for” someone: „sea tenudo de responderlos por su poder” “let him be bound to answer for them as far as he can”.^[10]

Semantic evolution

In medieval Latin the verb also meant to answer for a person or thing, to pay a due and to defend one's case in court.^[11] Alfonso X's prose uses responder for answering a question, answering someone who calls, replying to a letter and meeting an argument or a claim in court.^[12] Until the 17th century it was also used in the figurative sense now expressed by corresponder, “to return, match”.^[2] Covarrubias in 1611 gives this sense, of repaying good deeds, and says that not to live up to the worth of one's forebears is no responder to them.^[13]

The Diccionario de Autoridades adds “to grumble back, make excuses instead of obeying”, the resounding of an echo and the sense “to yield, bear fruit” said of land.^[14] The Academy's dictionary of 1817 has “to be responsible for something, stand surety for another”.^[15] Today the verb also means to react as expected, as a patient to a treatment.^[5][1]

The phrase responder al nombre de “to be called” is in the Academy's dictionary.^[5] Román, writing on Chilean usage, objected to it, holding that no sense of the verb covered it.^[16]

Timeline

• 1022 – first record, in a charter in Oelschläger's list.^[2][3]
• c. 1140 – the Cantar de mio Cid uses it for “to answer”.^[10][2]
• 1208 – the Cortes of León use it in the sense “to answer for”.^[10]
• c. 1250 – the old preterite respuso is first recorded.^[3]
• 1256 – the Picatrix uses it for answering someone who calls.^[12]
• 1280 – the fourth part of the General estoria uses it for replying to a letter.^[12]
• 1513 – Nebrija's Vocabulario gives Latin respondeo and refero as its equivalents.^[17]
• 1529 – first record in the Americas, in Nicaragua.^[18]
• c. 1580 – the derivative respondón “answering back” appears.^[3]
• 1611 – Covarrubias gives the senses “to answer” and “to be grateful, repay”.^[13]
• 1817 – the Academy's dictionary adds “to be responsible for something”.^[15]
• 1884 – the Academy's dictionary gives the etymology “Del lat. respondere”.^[19]

Meanings

Verb

1. To answer, reply: to say or write something in answer to a question or a message: Todavía no ha respondido a mi correo.^[5][1]
2. To answer a call, the telephone or the door: Toqué el timbre, pero no respondió nadie.^[5][20]
3. To talk back: to object to an order instead of carrying it out.^[5][1]
4. Of an animal, to answer the call of others of its kind, or a decoy imitating it.^[5]
5. To sing or recite in turn with what another person sings or recites.^[5]
6. Of an eco, to repeat a sound.^[5]
7. To return affection or favours; to corresponder.^[5]
8. To yield, give the expected result; to react as expected: La tierra no respondió aquel año.^[5][1]
9. To meet an action with another: Respondieron al ataque con piedras.^[5]
10. To be in proportion, correspond to something else.^[5]
11. Of a building or a place, to face, look towards a certain direction.^[5]
12. (with por or de) To answer for, be responsible for, vouch for: Yo respondo por mi hermano.^[5][1]

Word family

• respondón
• respuesta
• corresponder
• responsable

Related words

• responso

Usage notes

Responder and contestar are near-synonyms in most senses.^[20] The preterite repuso “he replied” belongs to this verb, not to reponer: Bello took it for a form of reponer, but Cuervo explained it as the dissimilated respuso.^[2]

References

1. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i Corominas, Joan; Pascual, José A. (1980–1991), Diccionario crítico etimológico castellano e hispánico, 6 vols., Madrid: Gredos, p. 4, 887
3. ^ a b c d e f Corominas, Joan (1973), Breve diccionario etimológico de la lengua castellana, 3rd ed., Madrid: Gredos, p. s.v. responder
4. ^ Academia de la Llingua Asturiana (2000), Diccionariu de la Llingua Asturiana, Uviéu: ALLA; online at https://mas.academiadelallingua.com/diccionariu, p. s.v. responder
5. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o 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. responder
6. ^ Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter, p. s.v. respondēre
7. ^ García de Diego, Vicente (1985), Diccionario etimológico español e hispánico, 2nd ed., Madrid: Espasa-Calpe (1st ed. 1954), p. 5637
8. ^ a b Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press, p. s.v. respondeō
9. ^ de Vaan, Michiel (2008), Etymological Dictionary of Latin and the other Italic Languages, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 7, Leiden; Boston: Brill
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. responder
11. ^ Niermeyer, J. F. (1976), Mediae Latinitatis Lexicon Minus, Leiden: Brill, p. s.v. respondere
12. ^ a b c 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. responder
13. ^ 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. 1261
14. ^ Real Academia Española (1726–1739), Diccionario de la lengua castellana (Diccionario de Autoridades), 6 vols., Madrid: Francisco del Hierro, p. 5, 598
15. ^ a b Real Academia Española (1817), Diccionario de la lengua castellana, 5th ed., Madrid: Imprenta Real, p. 758
16. ^ Román, Manuel Antonio (1901–1918), Diccionario de chilenismos y de otras voces y locuciones viciosas, 5 vols., Santiago de Chile: Imprenta de San José, p. 102
17. ^ Nebrija, Antonio de (1513), Vocabulario español-latino, Salamanca, ed. Marina Vidal Díez (2007), Biblioteca Virtual Miguel de Cervantes, p. 409
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. responder
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. 928
20. ^ a b Moliner, María (2007), Diccionario de uso del español, 3rd ed., Madrid: Gredos, p. s.v. responder