sonriente

Forms

sonriente m or f (masculine and feminine plural sonrientes)^[1]

Etymology

It is formed from Spanish sonreír + -nte, the old present participle of the verb.^[2][3][4] Wiktionary instead derives it directly from Latin subrīdēns, the present participle of subrīdeō (“to smile”).^[1]

The verb sonreír continues the same Latin verb, which Corominas treats under reír, from rīdeō (“to laugh”); it is first recorded in Spanish at the beginning of the 14th century.^[5][6] Its cognates are Catalan somriure, Occitan sorire, Portuguese sorrir, French sourire and Italian sorridere.^[7]

Earliest recorded meaning

The earliest record in the Academy's corpus is in Larra's Empeños y desempeños (1832), where the narrator says that, smiling, he told his nephew nothing.^[8] Corominas lists sonriente among the derivatives of sonreír without a date; the BDELC dates sonrisa to 1739.^[7][5]

Semantic evolution

In the 19th century the adjective became common in literary prose, often of things rather than people: Fernán Caballero speaks of death as a sonriente amiga (1849) and of a sonriente rosa (1852), and Castelar of a sky sonriente como la felicidad (1855).^[8] Purists objected to it: the Ecuadorian Tobar (1907) held that Spanish had no such participle of sonreír, that the native adjective was risueño, and that sonriente had been taken from French souriant.^[9] Garzón's Argentine dictionary (1910) accepted it as the participle of sonreír.^[10] Records from the Americas include Argentina (1925) and Mexico (1961).^[11] Judeo-Spanish has it too.^[12]

Timeline

• 1739 – Autoridades records the noun sonrisa.^[13][5]
• 1832 – Larra uses sonriente in Empeños y desempeños.^[8]
• 1849 – Fernán Caballero's La gaviota calls death a sonriente amiga.^[8]
• 1907 – Tobar condemns it as a Gallicism.^[9]
• 1925 – first record from the Americas, in Argentina.^[11]

Meanings

Adjective

1. smiling: who smiles: La niña nos recibió sonriente en la puerta.^[2][14][1]
2. Typical of someone who smiles, showing a smile: una mirada sonriente.^[15]
3. (of a thing or situation) Cheerful-looking, or favourable, as if smiling.^[4]

Related words

• sonreír
• sonrisa
• risueño
• Latin subrīdeō

References

1. ^ a b c d Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ 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. sonriente
3. ^ Real Academia Española (2001), Diccionario de la lengua española, 22nd ed., Madrid: Espasa-Calpe, p. s.v. sonriente
4. ^ a b Wikcionario (Spanish Wiktionary), es.wiktionary.org, p. s.v. sonriente
5. ^ a b c Corominas, Joan (1973), Breve diccionario etimológico de la lengua castellana, 3rd ed., Madrid: Gredos, p. s.v. reír
6. ^ 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. sonreír
7. ^ a b Corominas, Joan; Pascual, José A. (1980–1991), Diccionario crítico etimológico castellano e hispánico, 6 vols., Madrid: Gredos, p. 4, 857
8. ^ 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. sonriente
9. ^ a b Tobar, Carlos R. (1907), Consultas al Diccionario de la lengua, 2nd ed., Barcelona: Imprenta de la Revista Ibérica, p. 438
10. ^ Garzón, Tobías (1910), Diccionario argentino, Barcelona: Imprenta Elzeviriana de Borrás y Mestres, p. 455
11. ^ 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. sonriente
12. ^ Nehama, Joseph (1977), Dictionnaire du judéo-espagnol, Madrid: CSIC, p. s.v. sonriente
13. ^ Real Academia Española (1726–1739), Diccionario de la lengua castellana (Diccionario de Autoridades), 6 vols., Madrid: Francisco del Hierro, p. 6, 152
14. ^ Moliner, María (2007), Diccionario de uso del español, 3rd ed., Madrid: Gredos, p. s.v. sonriente
15. ^ Battaner Arias, Paz (dir.) (2017), Diccionario general de la lengua española VOX, Barcelona: Larousse Editorial, p. s.v. sonriente