traidor

Forms

traidor (feminine traidora, masculine plural traidores, feminine plural traidoras)^[1] Old Spanish wrote traidor and traydor, with the feminine traydora; the Old Spanish and Old Leonese form traedor appears in the Libro de Alexandre and the Leonese fueros.^[2][3][4]

Etymology

It is inherited from Old Spanish traydor, inherited from Latin trāditor (“one who hands over; traitor”).^[5][6][1] Corominas treats it as taken from Latin, and Wiktionary considers it perhaps semi-learned, the main evidence being its hiatus ⟨aï⟩ in Berceo; in Old Spanish it stood beside the verb traer (“to betray”).^[5][1] The Latin noun is formed from trādō (“to hand over”) with the agent suffix -tor, and that verb is a compound of trāns (“across”) and dō (“to give”).^[7][1] In Classical Latin it meant “one who hands over”; the sense “betrayer, traitor” belongs to post-Augustan Latin, and in Christian Latin it named the Christians who handed sacred objects over to the authorities.^[8][9]

The same Latin word is Portuguese traidor, Catalan traïdor, Old Occitan traidor, Italian traditore and Romanian trădător.^[10][3] Old Portuguese also had Old Galician-Portuguese tredo and tredro, from the Latin nominative, which is also the source of French traître.^[3][11]

Earliest recorded meaning

The Cantar de mio Cid (c. 1140, in a 14th-century copy) already uses traidor for “traitor”.^[5][12][2] In the laws of Alfonso X (1256–1300) traitors are among the criminals who may be taken out of a church without penalty.^[13]

Semantic evolution

Autoridades defines the traitor as one who breaks loyalty or sworn faith to a prince or sovereign, or the trust owed to friendship, and by extension applies the word to animals that fail in obedience to their owners, as a horse or a dog.^[14] As an adjective it also meant “treacherous, false”, said for instance of eyes that betray bad intentions.^[15] Cervantes has the saying that one may like the treason but hates the traitor.^[4] The 19th-century dictionaries record the proverb A un traidor, dos alevosos “to one traitor, two treacherous men”: whoever acts treacherously deserves no good faith.^[16][17] Modern dictionaries add the sense “more harmful than it seems”, of a cold or a breeze.^[6][18] In Mexico and Paraguay the noun is also a popular, disparaging word for a messenger.^[19]

Timeline

• c. 1140 – the Cantar de mio Cid uses traidor.^[5][12]
• 1220–1250 – Berceo uses the word with the hiatus traïdor.^[1]
• 1251 – the Fuero de Alcalá has traidor.^[20]
• 1256–1300 – the laws of Alfonso X speak of traydores.^[13]
• 1591 – Percyvall glosses it “a traitor”, Latin proditor.^[21]
• 1641 – first record of the related traicionero.^[5]
• 1726–1739 – Autoridades records the noun, the extension to animals and the adjective “treacherous”.^[14]
• 1738 – first record from the Americas, in New Granada, of a treacherous snake.^[22]
• 1884 – the Academy's dictionary gives the etymology from Latin traditor.^[23]

Meanings

Adjective

1. Who commits treason or betrays; traitorous; also as a noun.^[6][1]
2. (of an animal) unpredictable, liable to turn on its owner: Ojo con esa mula, que es traidora.^[6][1]
3. That shows or implies treachery or falseness: una mirada traidora.^[6]
4. More harmful than it seems: Ese sol de marzo es muy traidor.^[6][18]

Noun

1. A traitor, betrayer.^[6][1]
2. (Mexico, Paraguay, popular, derogatory) A messenger.^[19]

Word family

• traidoramente

Related words

• traición
• traicionero
• traicionar
• Latin traditor
• Portuguese traidor

Usage notes

The proverb A un traidor, dos alevosos says that a traitor deserves to be treated treacherously in turn.^[23][16]

References

1. ^ a b c d e f g h i Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b Diccionario del Español Medieval electrónico (DEMel), data publication 2026 (CC BY-SA), Universität Rostock, p. s.v. traidor
3. ^ a b c García de Diego, Vicente (1985), Diccionario etimológico español e hispánico, 2nd ed., Madrid: Espasa-Calpe (1st ed. 1954), p. 6789
4. ^ a b Cejador y Frauca, Julio (1905–1906), La lengua de Cervantes: gramática y diccionario de la lengua castellana en El ingenioso hidalgo don Quijote de la Mancha, 2 vols., Madrid: Jaime Ratés, p. s.v. traidor
5. ^ a b c d e Corominas, Joan (1973), Breve diccionario etimológico de la lengua castellana, 3rd ed., Madrid: Gredos, p. s.v. traición
6. ^ a b c d e f g 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. traidor
7. ^ Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
8. ^ Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
9. ^ Niermeyer, J. F. (1976), Mediae Latinitatis Lexicon Minus, Leiden: Brill
10. ^ Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter
11. ^ Rey, Alain, ed. (1992), Dictionnaire historique de la langue française, Paris: Le Robert
12. ^ a b Cejador y Frauca, Julio (1929), Vocabulario medieval castellano, Madrid: Librería y Casa Editorial Hernando, p. 412
13. ^ 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. traidor
14. ^ a b Real Academia Española (1726–1739), Diccionario de la lengua castellana (Diccionario de Autoridades), 6 vols., Madrid: Francisco del Hierro, p. 6, 320
15. ^ Real Academia Española (1726–1739), Diccionario de la lengua castellana (Diccionario de Autoridades), 6 vols., Madrid: Francisco del Hierro, p. 6
16. ^ a b Salvá, Vicente (1846), Nuevo diccionario de la lengua castellana, París: Librería de Don Vicente Salvá, p. 1065
17. ^ Real Academia Española (1869), Diccionario de la lengua castellana, 11th ed., Madrid: Imprenta de Don Manuel Rivadeneyra, p. 758
18. ^ a b Moliner, María (2007), Diccionario de uso del español, 3rd ed., Madrid: Gredos, p. s.v. traidor
19. ^ 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. traidor
20. ^ Hispanic Seminary of Medieval Studies (2026), Old Spanish Textual Archive (OSTA): semi-paleographic transcriptions of Old Spanish texts, ed. Francisco Gago Jover et al., https://www.hispanicseminary.org
21. ^ Percyvall, Richard (1591), Bibliothecae Hispanicae pars altera: containing a dictionarie in Spanish, English and Latine, London: John Jackson for Richard Watkins, p. 223
22. ^ 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. traidor
23. ^ 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. 1040