tornar

Forms

tornar (first-person singular present torno, first-person singular preterite torné, past participle tornado)^[1]

Etymology

It is inherited from Latin tornō (“to turn on a lathe”), a verb that also meant “to turn (an object) round”; the verb is common to all the Romance languages.^[2][3][4][1] The Latin verb is derived from tornus (“lathe”), from Ancient Greek τόρνος (tórnos, “lathe, turner's tool”).^[2][5][1] The DCECH derives the Greek word from τείρω (teírō, “to pierce”), and Wiktionary from Proto-Indo-European *terh₁- (“to rub, twist, turn”).^[2][1]

The same Latin verb is Portuguese tornar, Galician tornar, Asturian tornar, Aragonese tornar, Catalan tornar, Occitan tornar, French tourner, Italian tornare and Romanian turna.^[6][7][1] Spanish took turnar “to take turns” from the French verb, and turno from that.^[2][3]

Earliest recorded meaning

Corominas finds the verb in the Glosas Silenses and Emilianenses of the mid-10th century and in charters of the 11th and 12th centuries.^[2][3] In the Cantar de mio Cid (c. 1140, in a 14th-century copy) it means “to turn”: the weeping Cid „tornava la cabeça e estávalos catando” “turned his head and looked at them”.^[8][9] The poem also uses it for “to give back”, and reflexively for “to go back”: tornos pora su casa “he went back home”.^[9]

Semantic evolution

In the Cid tornar a or tornar de with an infinitive does not yet mean “to do again”;^[10] Menéndez Pidal notes that tornan tiendas a fincar is said of tents not pitched before.^[9] Alfonso X's prose has the four main senses of the verb: “to give back”, “to change, turn into”, “to return to a place” and, with a and an infinitive, “to do again”.^[11] Covarrubias (1611) adds tornar la comida “to vomit”, and tornar en sí “to come round”.^[10]

The Academy marked the sense “to change the nature of something” as obsolete from 1817 to 1884, but listed it again as current in 1899.^[12][13][14] Moliner gives volver as its synonym in each sense, and Vox labels the verb formal.^[15][16] Asturian and Leonese use it for stopping or turning back cattle, and Judeo-Spanish for “to come back”.^[17][18][19]

Timeline

• c. 950 – first recorded, in the Glosas Silenses and Emilianenses.^[2][3]
• c. 1140 – the Cantar de mio Cid uses it for “to turn”, “to give back” and “to go back”.^[9][8]
• 1182 – the first record in a text with no later copy, a fragment of a fuero: tornet pignora.^[8]
• 1250–1279 – Alfonso X's Lapidario uses tornar a with an infinitive for “to do again”.^[11]
• 1515 – the first record from the Americas, in Tierra Firme.^[20]
• 1611 – Covarrubias records tornar la comida “to vomit”.^[10]
• 1726–1739 – the Diccionario de Autoridades gives first the sense “to come back”.^[21]
• 1884 – the Academy gives the etymology: Latin tornare “to work on a lathe”.^[13]

Meanings

Verb

1. (transitive) To return, give back something to its owner.^[4][1]
2. (transitive) To put back in its usual place.^[4][1]
3. (transitive, also reflexive) To change the nature or state of someone or something;^[1] tornarse “to become”: El cielo se tornó gris.^[4][1]
4. (intransitive) To go back, come back to the place one left.^[4][1]
5. (intransitive, with a + infinitive) To do something again: tornó a llamar.^[4][1]
6. (intransitive) To come round, recover consciousness.^[4][1]
7. (Colombia, falconry) To swing the arm through part of a circle to launch the hawk from the fist.^[4]

Word family

• tornada
• tornadizo
• retornar
• entornar
• trastornar
• tornasol

Related words

• contorno
• tornillo
• torno
• turnar
• turno
• Latin tornus
• French tourner

References

1. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f Corominas, Joan; Pascual, José A. (1980–1991), Diccionario crítico etimológico castellano e hispánico, 6 vols., Madrid: Gredos, p. 5, 558
3. ^ a b c d Corominas, Joan (1973), Breve diccionario etimológico de la lengua castellana, 3rd ed., Madrid: Gredos, p. s.v. torno
4. ^ a b c d e f g h 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. tornar
5. ^ Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press, p. s.v. tornō
6. ^ Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter
7. ^ García de Diego, Vicente (1985), Diccionario etimológico español e hispánico, 2nd ed., Madrid: Espasa-Calpe (1st ed. 1954), p. 6751
8. ^ a b c Real Academia Española (2013–), Corpus del Diccionario histórico de la lengua española (CDH), version 3.1, https://apps.rae.es/CNDHE, p. s.v. tornar
9. ^ a b c d Menéndez Pidal, Ramón (1908–1911), Cantar de Mio Cid: texto, gramática y vocabulario, 3 vols., Madrid: Bailly-Baillière, p. s.v. tornar
10. ^ a b c Covarrubias Orozco, Sebastián de (1611), Tesoro de la lengua castellana o española, Madrid: Luis Sánchez (Biblioteca Wordkers transcription, CC BY 4.0), p. 1337
11. ^ 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), p. s.v. tornar
12. ^ Real Academia Española (1817), Diccionario de la lengua castellana, 5th ed., Madrid: Imprenta Real, p. 850
13. ^ a b Real Academia Española (1884), Diccionario de la lengua castellana, 12th ed., Madrid: Imprenta de D. Gregorio Hernando (the first Academy edition with etymologies), p. 1035
14. ^ Real Academia Española (1899), Diccionario de la lengua castellana, 13th ed., Madrid: Imprenta de los Sres. Hernando y Compañía, p. 970
15. ^ Moliner, María (2007), Diccionario de uso del español, 3rd ed., Madrid: Gredos, p. s.v. tornar
16. ^ Battaner Arias, Paz (dir.) (2017), Diccionario general de la lengua española VOX, Barcelona: Larousse Editorial, p. s.v. tornar
17. ^ Le Men Loyer, Janick (2002–2012), Léxico del leonés actual, 4 vols., León: Centro de Estudios e Investigación San Isidoro; electronic version, Universidad de León, p. s.v. tornar
18. ^ Rato y Hevia, Apolinar de (1891), Vocabulario de las palabras y frases bables que se hablaron antiguamente y de las que hoy se hablan en el Principado de Asturias, Madrid: Manuel G. Hernández, p. 117
19. ^ Nehama, Joseph (1977), Dictionnaire du judéo-espagnol, Madrid: CSIC, p. s.v. tornâr
20. ^ 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. tornar
21. ^ Real Academia Española (1726–1739), Diccionario de la lengua castellana (Diccionario de Autoridades), 6 vols., Madrid: Francisco del Hierro, p. 6, 303