voluntad

Forms

voluntad f (plural voluntades)^[1] Old Spanish texts also write uoluntad, uoluntat, voluntat and veluntad; the Cid has veluntad beside voluntad.^[2][3]

Etymology

It is inherited from Old Spanish voluntad, inherited from Latin voluntās (“will, choice”), taken from the accusative.^[4][5][6][1] Corominas and Wiktionary treat it as a semi-learned word that became part of the popular language very early: the /u/ of the Latin word was kept, which shows the influence of written Latin from the start.^[4][1] Corominas finds this unsurprising, since the Latin verb velle (“to want”) itself did not survive in Spanish.^[4]

In the other Romance languages the word has a popular form, as in Portuguese vontade and Old Catalan volentat, although Latin influence later reached several of them too.^[4] The same Latin word is Italian volontà, French volonté, Occitan volontat and Catalan voluntat, and it was borrowed into Basque as borondate.^[7][8][1] Alcover and Moll explain the Old Catalan form as a dissimilation of the vowels, helped by the participle volent.^[9]

Corominas also records a variant volunta, taken from the Latin nominative and still heard in Asturian, and an old legal verb voluntar “to will”, in a document of 1219.^[4]

The Latin noun is a derivative of that verb, which goes back to Proto-Italic *welmi and Proto-Indo-European *welh₁- (“to strive after, choose”).^[10][11][12]

Earliest recorded meaning

Corominas finds the word in the Glosas Silenses, in a charter of 1027 and in the Cantar de mio Cid; the BDELC dates the first record to the end of the 10th century.^[4][5] In the Cid (c. 1140, in a 14th-century copy) Martín Antolínez rides off with the moneylenders de voluntad e de grado “willingly and gladly”.^[13] The poem uses the word for “desire” and for the decree of God, and often in phrases meaning “gladly”: de veluntad, de buena voluntad, de toda voluntad.^[3] De cuer e de voluntad means “from the heart”, and la voluntad me lo diz “my heart tells me so”.^[3]

Semantic evolution

In the prose of Alfonso X the word names the faculty of the soul that moves one to act or not to act, as well as free will, intention and desire: a stone in the Lapidario gives its bearer grand voluntad de mugier “a great desire for women”.^[14] The Estoria de España calls man voluntat encarnada, “will made flesh”.^[14] Berceo uses de toda voluntad for “with all one's heart”.^[4]

The Diccionario de Autoridades defined voluntad as one of the powers of the soul, whose acts are wanting and not wanting, and in God as His decrees.^[15] The Academy's dictionary of 1817 also listed the sense “delight, pleasure”, which no longer appears in 1869.^[16][17] The 1884 edition gave the Latin etymology for the first time.^[18]

Today the word also means willpower and perseverance, and colloquially affection for someone.^[19][1] La voluntad is used when the price of something, or a donation, is left to the giver, and colloquially for a tip.^[6] In psychology it names the process by which a person decides on an action.^[20]

Timeline

• late 10th century – the first record, in the Glosas Silenses.^[4][5]
• 1027 – a charter in Oelschläger's list.^[4]
• c. 1140 – the Cantar de mio Cid uses voluntad and veluntad, often in the phrase de voluntad e de grado.^[13][3]
• 1219 – the legal verb voluntar appears in a document.^[4]
• 1250–1279 – Alfonso X's Lapidario uses the word for free will, intention and desire.^[14]
• 1438 – first record of voluntario.^[5]
• 1525 – the first record from the Americas, in Mexico City: es mi voluntad que… “it is my will that…”.^[21]
• 1591 – Percyvall translates it as English “will” and Latin voluntas.^[22]
• 1611 – Covarrubias derives it from the Latin noun.^[23]
• 1726–1739 – the Diccionario de Autoridades defines it as a power of the soul.^[15]
• 1739 – first records of volición and volitivo, learned words of the same Latin root.^[5]
• 1884 – the Academy's dictionary gives the etymology “Del lat. voluntas”.^[18]

Meanings

Noun

1. will: the faculty of deciding on and directing one's own conduct.^[6][1]
2. An act of the will by which something is accepted or rejected.^[6]
3. Free will, free choice.^[6]
4. A choice made without any rule or outside pressure that compels it.^[6]
5. Intention, resolve to do something: Lo dijo sin voluntad de herir a nadie.^[6][19]
6. Love, affection, goodwill towards someone.^[6][19]
7. Wish or desire to do something.^[6][1]
8. The order or command of someone: Cumplieron la voluntad de su padre.^[6]
9. A choice made by one's own judgment or liking, without regard to anything else, as in por propia voluntad.^[6]
10. consent, assent.^[6]
11. (with la) A formula for asking a price or donation whose amount is left to the giver.^[6][19]
12. (colloquial, with la) Tip, gratuity.^[6]
13. willpower; perseverance in an effort.^[19][1]

Word family

• voluntario
• voluntariado
• voluntarioso
• voluntariedad

Related words

• volición
• volitivo
• veleidad
• voluptuoso
• Latin voluntās
• Portuguese vontade

Usage notes

Common phrases are última voluntad “last will”, also the testament itself, mala voluntad “ill will, enmity”, buena voluntad “goodwill”, fuerza de voluntad “willpower” and a voluntad “at will”.^[6][1][24]

References

1. ^ a b c d e f g h i j 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. voluntad
3. ^ a b c d Menéndez Pidal, Ramón (1908–1911), Cantar de Mio Cid: texto, gramática y vocabulario, 3 vols., Madrid: Bailly-Baillière, p. 493
4. ^ a b c d e f g h i j Corominas, Joan; Pascual, José A. (1980–1991), Diccionario crítico etimológico castellano e hispánico, 6 vols., Madrid: Gredos, p. 5, 839
5. ^ a b c d e Corominas, Joan (1973), Breve diccionario etimológico de la lengua castellana, 3rd ed., Madrid: Gredos, p. s.v. voluntad
6. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o 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. voluntad
7. ^ Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter, p. s.v. voluntas
8. ^ García de Diego, Vicente (1985), Diccionario etimológico español e hispánico, 2nd ed., Madrid: Espasa-Calpe (1st ed. 1954), p. art. 7265
9. ^ Alcover, Antoni M.; Moll, Francesc de B. (1930–1962), Diccionari català-valencià-balear, 10 vols., Palma de Mallorca: Moll, p. s.v. voluntat
10. ^ de Vaan, Michiel (2008), Etymological Dictionary of Latin and the other Italic Languages, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 7, Leiden; Boston: Brill
11. ^ Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
12. ^ Gómez de Silva, Guido (1988), Breve diccionario etimológico de la lengua española, México: Fondo de Cultura Económica / El Colegio de México, p. s.v. voluntad
13. ^ a b Real Academia Española (2013–), Corpus del Diccionario histórico de la lengua española (CDH), version 3.1, https://apps.rae.es/CNDHE, p. s.v. voluntad
14. ^ a b c 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. voluntad
15. ^ a b Real Academia Española (1726–1739), Diccionario de la lengua castellana (Diccionario de Autoridades), 6 vols., Madrid: Francisco del Hierro, p. 6, 518
16. ^ Real Academia Española (1817), Diccionario de la lengua castellana, 5th ed., Madrid: Imprenta Real, p. 899
17. ^ Real Academia Española (1869), Diccionario de la lengua castellana, 11th ed., Madrid: Imprenta de Don Manuel Rivadeneyra, p. 801
18. ^ 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. 1098
19. ^ a b c d e Moliner, María (2007), Diccionario de uso del español, 3rd ed., Madrid: Gredos, p. s.v. voluntad
20. ^ Real Academia Nacional de Medicina (2011), Diccionario de términos médicos, Madrid: Editorial Médica Panamericana; online at https://dtme.ranm.es, p. s.v. voluntad
21. ^ 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. voluntad
22. ^ Percyvall, Richard (1591), Bibliothecae Hispanicae pars altera: containing a dictionarie in Spanish, English and Latine, London: John Jackson for Richard Watkins, p. 231
23. ^ Covarrubias Orozco, Sebastián de (1611), Tesoro de la lengua castellana o española, Madrid: Luis Sánchez (Biblioteca Wordkers transcription, CC BY 4.0), p. 1394
24. ^ Alemany y Bolufer, José (1917), Diccionario de la lengua española, Barcelona: Ramón Sopena, p. 1672