soler

Forms

soler (first-person singular present suelo, first-person singular preterite solí, past participle (rare but acceptable) solido)^[1] Old Spanish had the imperfect forms solie, soliés, solién and soliá beside solía.^[2][3] The stressed forms of the present have ue (suelo, sueles, suele, suelen), and the verb is defective, as Autoridades already notes.^[4]

Etymology

The verb meaning “to be accustomed” is inherited from Old Spanish soler, inherited from Latin soleō (“to be used to”), and has been in use since the Cid.^[5][6][7][1] The same Latin verb gave Italian solere, Old French soloir, Old Occitan soler, Catalan soler and Portuguese soer.^[8][1] The medieval form Galician soer has been lost in Portuguese, according to Corominas, but is still used in Galicia;^[9] Houaiss calls the Portuguese verb little used.^[5][9]

The origin of the Latin verb is disputed.^[10] De Vaan reconstructs *sol-ē- (“to occupy”) and *sol-eh₁- (“to occupy, inhabit”), perhaps related to solum (“ground”), and rejects the older derivation, preferred by Walde–Hofmann and Pokorny, from a form akin to suēscō (“to become used to”) and sodālis (“companion”), because the following front vowel would have blocked the expected change of the initial consonant group.^[10][1]

Earliest recorded meaning

In the Cantar de mio Cid (c. 1140, in a 14th-century copy) an opponent is mocked as a miller: fuesse a río d'Ovirna los molinos picar e prender maquilas, commo lo suele far “let him go to the river Ovirna to dress the millstones and take the miller's fee, as he usually does”.^[2][5] Here, as later, it is an auxiliary with an infinitive.^[11]

Semantic evolution

The verb is frequent in every period, from Berceo and the Libro de Alexandre on.^[5] Alfonso X's Lapidario already uses it both for a habit and for something that usually happens.^[12] Nebrija's Vocabulario renders it with suesco beside soleo.^[13]

Today the competition of acostumbrar has limited it, and in parts of the Americas saber is generally used in this sense instead.^[5] In Chile Román noted that many educated speakers took it to mean “to happen now and then”, the opposite of its real sense, and that the south used invented forms such as suelgo.^[14] The verb is used only in the present, the imperfect and the simple and compound past.^[15] Moliner records the proverb al cabo de los años mil, vuelven las aguas por donde solían ir.^[15]

Timeline

• c. 1140 – the Cantar de mio Cid has commo lo suele far.^[2][6]
• c. 1201 – the Disputa del alma y el cuerpo has the imperfect soliés.^[2]
• 1250–1279 – Alfonso X's Lapidario uses it for habits and for frequent events.^[12]
• c. 1495 – Nebrija gives Latin soleo and suesco.^[13][16]
• 1529 – first record from the Americas, in Nicaragua.^[17]
• 1611 – Covarrubias derives it from Latin soleo.^[18]
• 1726–1739 – Autoridades calls it irregular and defective.^[4]
• 1884 – the Academy gives the etymology from Latin solere.^[19]

Meanings

Verb

1. (auxiliary, with an infinitive) Of a person or animal: to be in the habit of, to usually do something: Mi abuela suele dormir la siesta después de comer.^[7][1]
2. (auxiliary) Of an event or thing: to be frequent, to tend to happen: En marzo suele hacer viento.^[7][1]
3. (in the imperfect) used to: Solíamos veranear en Asturias.^[1][15]

Related words

• insolente
• insólito
• obsoleto
• acostumbrar
• sólito
• Latin soleō
• Catalan soler

Usage notes

A separate nautical noun soler, the planking in the lowest part of a ship's hold, was borrowed from Catalan soler, which continues sōlārium, from solum (“ground”).^{[20][21][22][23]} It is in Terreros, and in the Academy's dictionary from 1843.^[24][25]

References

1. ^ a b c d e f g h Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ 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
3. ^ Diccionario del Español Medieval electrónico (DEMel), data publication 2026 (CC BY-SA), Universität Rostock
4. ^ a b Real Academia Española (1726–1739), Diccionario de la lengua castellana (Diccionario de Autoridades), 6 vols., Madrid: Francisco del Hierro, p. 6, 140
5. ^ a b c d e Corominas, Joan; Pascual, José A. (1980–1991), Diccionario crítico etimológico castellano e hispánico, 6 vols., Madrid: Gredos, p. 5, 295
6. ^ a b Corominas, Joan (1973), Breve diccionario etimológico de la lengua castellana, 3rd ed., Madrid: Gredos, p. s.v. soler
7. ^ a b c 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. soler
8. ^ Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter
9. ^ a b Houaiss, Antônio; Villar, Mauro de Salles (2001), Dicionário Houaiss da língua portuguesa, Rio de Janeiro: Objetiva, p. s.v. soer
10. ^ a b de Vaan, Michiel (2008), Etymological Dictionary of Latin and the other Italic Languages, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 7, Leiden; Boston: Brill
11. ^ Menéndez Pidal, Ramón (1908–1911), Cantar de Mio Cid: texto, gramática y vocabulario, 3 vols., Madrid: Bailly-Baillière, p. 450
12. ^ 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)
13. ^ a b Nebrija, Antonio de (1513), Vocabulario español-latino, Salamanca, ed. Marina Vidal Díez (2007), Biblioteca Virtual Miguel de Cervantes
14. ^ Román, Manuel Antonio (1901–1918), Diccionario de chilenismos y de otras voces y locuciones viciosas, 5 vols., Santiago de Chile: Imprenta de San José
15. ^ a b c Moliner, María (2007), Diccionario de uso del español, 3rd ed., Madrid: Gredos, p. s.v. soler
16. ^ 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. soler
17. ^ Boyd-Bowman, Peter (2003), Léxico hispanoamericano 1493–1993, ed. Ray Harris-Northall and John J. Nitti, New York: Hispanic Seminary of Medieval Studies
18. ^ Covarrubias Orozco, Sebastián de (1611), Tesoro de la lengua castellana o española, Madrid: Luis Sánchez (Biblioteca Wordkers transcription, CC BY 4.0), p. 1305
19. ^ Real Academia Española (1884), Diccionario de la lengua castellana, 12th ed., Madrid: Imprenta de D. Gregorio Hernando (the first Academy edition with etymologies)
20. ^ 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. soler1
21. ^ García de Diego, Vicente (1985), Diccionario etimológico español e hispánico, 2nd ed., Madrid: Espasa-Calpe (1st ed. 1954)
22. ^ Alcover, Antoni M.; Moll, Francesc de B. (1930–1962), Diccionari català-valencià-balear, 10 vols., Palma de Mallorca: Moll, p. s.v. soler
23. ^ Prat Sabater, Marta (2003), Préstamos del catalán en el léxico español, doctoral thesis, Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona
24. ^ 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
25. ^ Real Academia Española (1843), Diccionario de la lengua castellana, 9th ed., Madrid: Imprenta de D. Francisco María Fernández