salvia

Forms

salvia f (plural salvias)^[1]

Etymology

It is inherited from Latin salvia (“sage”).^[2][3][1] The Latin name seems to be derived from salvus (“safe, sound”), for the beneficial properties of the herb.^[2][4][5] The OLD gives the derivation as probable only, and records the Latin word also as a title of Persephone.^[6] The Diccionario de Autoridades called the Spanish word purely Latin.^[7]

The same Latin word is Italian salvia, Romanian salbie, French sauge, Portuguese salva and the German Salbei.^[8][5][9] The popular forms of Galicia are Galician sarxa or xarxa.^[2]

Earliest recorded meaning

The Razón de amor, of the first half of the 13th century, names sage among the sweet-smelling herbs around a spring: y es la saluia, y sson as rosas, y el liryo & las uiolas.^[10][11] Corominas dated it only from 1399, in the Spanish Confesión del Amante of Gower, where the form may be selvia.^[2]

Semantic evolution

Medieval texts use sage as a medicine, for horses in the Libro de los caballos and for people in the Historia de la donzella Teodor.^[10] Covarrubias in 1611 credited it with many virtues, especially for helping women conceive, after Laguna's Dioscorides.^[12] The Diccionario de Autoridades knew two kinds, a greater and a lesser, wild and garden sage, and the Academy noted in 1817 that people who had suffered palsy chewed its leaves.^[7][13]

In the Americas the name passed to other aromatic plants: in Argentina, Cuba and Uruguay a plant of the verbena family used for a stomach infusion, in Honduras, El Salvador and Nicaragua a shrub of the genus Buddleja, and in Mexico many plants of several families.^[3][14][15] In the Canaries salvia is the native Salvia canariensis, recorded in Gran Canaria from 1536.^[16]

Timeline

• 1205–1250 – the Razón de amor, in a copy of 1250–1260.^[10][11]
• c. 1275 – the Libro de los caballos prescribes it for horses.^[10]
• 1385 – the Capítulo de las labores lists it among plants to transplant.^[10]
• 1399 – the Spanish version of Gower, the DCECH's first record.^[2]
• c. 1495 – Nebrija calls it a well-known herb.^[17]
• 1536 – salbias in the land grants of Gran Canaria.^[16]
• 1549 – the first American record, from Santo Domingo.^[18]
• 1611 – Covarrubias praises its virtues.^[12]
• 1884 – the Academy gives its etymology, from Latin salvia.^[19]

Meanings

Noun

1. sage (Salvia officinalis), a labiate shrub of dry land with narrow wavy-edged leaves and bluish flowers in spikes, whose leaves are boiled as a sudorific and astringent; also other species of the genus: Echó unas hojas de salvia en la sartén.^[3][20][1]
2. (Argentina, Cuba, Uruguay) A fragrant plant of the verbena family, used against haemorrhoids and for a stomach infusion.^[3]
3. (Honduras, El Salvador, Nicaragua) A shrub up to three metres tall (Buddleja americana), with leaves white-haired beneath, used in folk medicine.^[14]

Related words

• salvo
• salvar
• Latin salvus
• Portuguese salva

References

1. ^ a b c d Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e Corominas, Joan; Pascual, José A. (1980–1991), Diccionario crítico etimológico castellano e hispánico, 6 vols., Madrid: Gredos, p. 5, 142
3. ^ a b c d 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. salvia
4. ^ Gómez de Silva, Guido (1988), Breve diccionario etimológico de la lengua española, México: Fondo de Cultura Económica / El Colegio de México, p. 628
5. ^ a b Rey, Alain, ed. (1992), Dictionnaire historique de la langue française, Paris: Le Robert, p. s.v. sauge
6. ^ Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
7. ^ a b Real Academia Española (1726–1739), Diccionario de la lengua castellana (Diccionario de Autoridades), 6 vols., Madrid: Francisco del Hierro, p. 6, 35
8. ^ Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter, p. 7558
9. ^ Cunha, Antônio Geraldo da (2010), Dicionário etimológico da língua portuguesa, 4th ed., Rio de Janeiro: Lexikon, p. 3001
10. ^ a b c d e Real Academia Española (2013–), Corpus del Diccionario histórico de la lengua española (CDH), version 3.1, https://apps.rae.es/CNDHE, p. s.v. salvia
11. ^ a b Diccionario del Español Medieval electrónico (DEMel), data publication 2026 (CC BY-SA), Universität Rostock, p. s.v. salvia
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. 1280
13. ^ Real Academia Española (1817), Diccionario de la lengua castellana, 5th ed., Madrid: Imprenta Real, p. 783
14. ^ a b Asociación de Academias de la Lengua Española (2010), Diccionario de americanismos, Lima: Santillana; online at https://www.asale.org/damer, p. s.v. salvia
15. ^ Santamaría, Francisco J. (1959), Diccionario de mejicanismos, México: Porrúa, p. 958
16. ^ a b Real Academia Española (2021–), Tesoro de los diccionarios históricos de la lengua española (TDHLE): Diccionario histórico (1933–1936), its unpublished slips, Diccionario histórico (1960–1996), DHECan, DHECR, DHEVen, https://www.rae.es/tdhle, p. s.v. salvia
17. ^ 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. salvia
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. salvia
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. 955
20. ^ Moliner, María (2007), Diccionario de uso del español, 3rd ed., Madrid: Gredos, p. s.v. salvia