vender

Forms

vender (first-person singular present vendo, first-person singular preterite vendí, past participle vendido)^[1] Old Spanish texts often spell it uender.^[2][3]

Etymology

It is inherited from Latin vendo (“to sell”); the Old Spanish form was already vender.^[4][5][6][1] It is common to all the Romance languages: Portuguese vender, Galician vender, Catalan vendre, French vendre, Italian vendere and Romanian vinde.^[4][7][1]

The Latin verb is a late contraction of a phrase meaning “to put up for sale”, made of venum (“sale”) and do (“to give”); this explains its long vowel before a nasal and a stop, against the normal Latin sound laws.^[4][8][1] The noun goes back to Proto-Indo-European *wes- (“to sell, buy”), like Ancient Greek ὦνος (ônos, “price”) and Sanskrit वस्न (vasna, “price”).^[1][9]

Earliest recorded meaning

Corominas dates the verb to the beginnings of the language, the Glosas Silenses and the Cid; his Breve diccionario says the end of the 10th century.^[4][5] In the Cantar de mio Cid (c. 1140, in a 14th-century copy) nobody in Burgos „le osarién vender al menos dinarada” “would dare sell him even a penny's worth”.^[3] The Cortes of Benavente of 1202 use it of the king selling coinage.^[3]

Semantic evolution

Berceo already used the figurative “to betray”: el disçipulo lo vendió, of Judas.^[10] The Diccionario de Autoridades had “to sell”, “to offer goods to the public” and, figuratively, selling intangible things for gain, one's honour or justice.^[11] Covarrubias recorded the proverb pregonar vino y vender vinagre for those who promise much and deliver little.^[12] The Academy's 1884 edition had “to betray a friend's trust” and the reflexive “to boast of what one is not”.^[13]

Recent senses are “to present someone or something persuasively” and the intransitive “to sell well, be popular”.^[6][14] The Americas have many phrases, such as vender como pan caliente “to sell like hot cakes”.^[15]

Timeline

• 900s – the Glosas Silenses, the first record according to Corominas.^[4][5]
• c. 1140 – the Cantar de mio Cid (in a 14th-century copy).^[3][4]
• 1187 – first record of vendedor.^[4][5]
• 1206 – first record of venta.^[4][5]
• 1220–1250 – Berceo uses it for Judas's betrayal.^[10]
• c. 1495 – Nebrija gives Latin vendo and venundo.^[16]
• 1521 – the first record from the Americas, in Cuba.^[17]
• 1611 – Covarrubias records pregonar vino y vender vinagre.^[12]

Meanings

Verb

1. To sell, hand over the ownership of something for an agreed price: Vendieron la casa del pueblo.^[6][1]
2. To offer goods for sale to the public: En esa tienda venden pan.^[6]
3. To give up something with no material value for gain: vender su conciencia.^[6][11]
4. To betray someone's trust or friendship.^[6]
5. To present something or someone skilfully and persuasively: Sabe vender sus proyectos.^[6][14]
6. (intransitive) To sell well, be popular: Los libros de cocina venden mucho.^[6]
7. (reflexive) To let oneself be bribed.^[6]
8. (reflexive) To offer oneself at any risk for someone.^[6]
9. (reflexive) To give oneself away without meaning to.^[6]
10. (reflexive) To pass oneself off as what one is not.^[6]

Word family

• vendedor
• vendible
• revender
• retrovender

Related words

• venta
• venal
• Latin vendo
• Portuguese vender

Usage notes

Set phrases include vender gato por liebre “to cheat someone”, vender humo “to make empty promises” and the proverb no vendas la piel del oso antes de cazarlo.^[1]

References

1. ^ a b c d e f g h Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ Diccionario del Español Medieval electrónico (DEMel), data publication 2026 (CC BY-SA), Universität Rostock, p. s.v. vender
3. ^ 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. vender
4. ^ a b c d e f g h Corominas, Joan; Pascual, José A. (1980–1991), Diccionario crítico etimológico castellano e hispánico, 6 vols., Madrid: Gredos, p. 5, 768
5. ^ a b c d e Corominas, Joan (1973), Breve diccionario etimológico de la lengua castellana, 3rd ed., Madrid: Gredos, p. s.v. vender
6. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l 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. vender
7. ^ García de Diego, Vicente (1985), Diccionario etimológico español e hispánico, 2nd ed., Madrid: Espasa-Calpe (1st ed. 1954), p. 7067
8. ^ Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press, p. s.v. vendo
9. ^ Gómez de Silva, Guido (1988), Breve diccionario etimológico de la lengua española, México: Fondo de Cultura Económica / El Colegio de México, p. 719
10. ^ a b Lanchetas, Rufino (1900), Gramática y vocabulario de las obras de Gonzalo de Berceo, Madrid: Sucesores de Rivadeneyra, p. 781
11. ^ a b Real Academia Española (1726–1739), Diccionario de la lengua castellana (Diccionario de Autoridades), 6 vols., Madrid: Francisco del Hierro, p. 6, 441
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. 1376
13. ^ Real Academia Española (1884), Diccionario de la lengua castellana, 12th ed., Madrid: Imprenta de D. Gregorio Hernando (the first Academy edition with etymologies), p. 1077
14. ^ a b Universidad de Murcia, NEOMA: Diccionario de neologismos del español actual (online), p. s.v. vender
15. ^ Asociación de Academias de la Lengua Española (2010), Diccionario de americanismos, Lima: Santillana; online at https://www.asale.org/damer, p. s.v. vender
16. ^ Nebrija, Antonio de (1513), Vocabulario español-latino, Salamanca, ed. Marina Vidal Díez (2007), Biblioteca Virtual Miguel de Cervantes, p. 429
17. ^ 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. vender