apenas

Forms

apenas (not comparable)^[1] Old Galician-Portuguese wrote apẽas and apeas beside apenas; the manuscripts of a medieval chronicle also have apennas and apeñas.^[2][3][4]

Etymology

It is formed from Portuguese a + pena (“punishment; hardship”), with the noun in the plural: literally “with pains”, hence “with difficulty”.^[3][4][5][6] Houaiss takes it for a shortened form of phrases such as a duras penas “with hard pains”, as João Ribeiro had explained it from the Spanish a malas penas and a duras penas found in Cervantes.^[3][7] Wiktionary instead derives it from Vulgar Latin *ad poenam, with the adverbial ⟨-s⟩ also seen in entrementes.^[1]

The noun, old Old Galician-Portuguese pea, comes from Latin poena (“penalty, punishment; later also pain, hardship”), itself a loan from Ancient Greek ποινή (poinḗ, “penalty, fine, blood money”).^{[8][9][1][10]} The same formation is Spanish apenas, recorded from the first half of the 13th century, Italian appena and French à peine.^[3][7][11]

Earliest recorded meaning

Houaiss and Cunha date the word to the 13th century.^[3][4] One of the Cantigas de Santa Maria says of a dreaded place que apẽas achavan quen y entrasse “that they could hardly find anyone who would go in”, with the sense “hardly, with difficulty”.^[2]

Semantic evolution

In a medieval chronicle the word means both “only, solely” and “hardly, with difficulty”.^[2] The DDGM's chronicle glossary notes that it was little used in the medieval language: Machado knew no medieval examples, those Morais gives are of the 17th century, and Machado's dictionary places the word in the 16th century.^[2][5] Cardoso's dictionary of 1569 renders it with Latin vix and difficulter, and Barbosa (1611) explains it as “with difficulty, and with toil”.^[12][13] Bluteau adds that it is said of the difficulty with which a thing is done, or of exact, strict time.^[14] Morais's edition of 1813 records the temporal conjunction “as soon as”.^[15]

In today's language the sense “only, merely” is the commonest.^[1][16] Wiktionary labels the sense “barely” as chiefly European and African.^[1][16]

Timeline

• 13th century – apẽas in the Cantigas de Santa Maria.^[2][3] Houaiss's oldest form is apeas.^[2][3]
• 14th century – Houaiss dates the spelling apenas.^[3]
• c. 1450 – apenas in the Livro das tres vertudes.^[17]
• 1569 – Cardoso glosses it with Latin vix and difficulter.^[12]
• 1611 – Barbosa: “with difficulty, and with toil”.^[13]
• 1813 – Morais records the sense “as soon as”.^[15]

Meanings

Adverb

1. only, merely, no more than: Comprou apenas pão e leite.^[3][16][1]
2. With difficulty, barely, hardly: A luz era tão fraca que apenas se lia a placa.^[3][16][1]

Conjunction

1. as soon as: Apenas o comboio parou, saltou para a plataforma.^[3][18][19]

Related words

• pena
• Spanish apenas
• Italian appena

References

1. ^ a b c d e f g h i j Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f Instituto da Lingua Galega, Dicionario de dicionarios do galego medieval (DDGM), ed. Ernesto González Seoane, Santiago de Compostela: Universidade de Santiago de Compostela, https://ilg.usc.gal/ddgm, p. s.v. apenas
3. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k Houaiss, Antônio; Villar, Mauro de Salles (2001), Dicionário Houaiss da língua portuguesa, Rio de Janeiro: Objetiva, p. s.v. apenas
4. ^ a b c Cunha, Antônio Geraldo da (2010), Dicionário etimológico da língua portuguesa, 4th ed., Rio de Janeiro: Lexikon, p. s.v. apenas
5. ^ a b Machado, José Pedro (1987), Dicionário etimológico da língua portuguesa, 4th ed., 5 vols., Lisboa: Livros Horizonte, p. s.v. apenas
6. ^ Nascentes, Antenor (1966), Dicionário etimológico resumido, Rio de Janeiro: Instituto Nacional do Livro, p. s.v. apenas
7. ^ a b Nascentes, Antenor (1955), Dicionário etimológico da língua portuguesa, vol. 1: Nomes comuns, Rio de Janeiro (1st ed. 1932, preface by W. Meyer-Lübke), p. s.v. apenas
8. ^ Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter, p. 6638
9. ^ García de Diego, Vicente (1985), Diccionario etimológico español e hispánico, 2nd ed., Madrid: Espasa-Calpe (1st ed. 1954), p. s.v. poena
10. ^ Rey, Alain, ed. (1992), Dictionnaire historique de la langue française, Paris: Le Robert, p. s.v. peine
11. ^ Corominas, Joan (1973), Breve diccionario etimológico de la lengua castellana, 3rd ed., Madrid: Gredos, p. s.v. pena
12. ^ a b Cardoso, Jerónimo (1569–1570), Dictionarium ex lusitanico in latinum sermonem, Lisboa: João Álvares (CLP transcription, Universidade de Aveiro), p. s.v. apenas
13. ^ a b Barbosa, Agostinho (1611), Dictionarium lusitanicolatinum, Braga: Fructuoso Lourenço de Basto (CLP transcription, Universidade de Aveiro), p. s.v. apenas
14. ^ Bluteau, Raphael (1712–1728), Vocabulario portuguez e latino, 8 vols. + 2 supplement vols., Coimbra / Lisboa (CLP transcription, Universidade de Aveiro), p. s.v. apenas
15. ^ a b Silva, António de Morais (1813), Diccionario da lingua portugueza, 2nd ed., 2 vols., Lisboa: Typographia Lacerdina, p. 1, 151
16. ^ a b c d Ferreira, Aurélio Buarque de Holanda, Novo dicionário Aurélio da língua portuguesa, digital edition, p. s.v. apenas
17. ^ Centro de Linguística da Universidade de Lisboa, CTA – Corpus de Textos Antigos, https://teitok.clul.ul.pt/cta, p. s.v. apenas
18. ^ Dicionário Priberam da Língua Portuguesa, Lisboa: Priberam Informática, https://dicionario.priberam.org, p. s.v. apenas
19. ^ Academia das Ciências de Lisboa, Dicionário da Língua Portuguesa, revised online edition (2023–) of the Dicionário da Língua Portuguesa Contemporânea (2001), https://dicionario.acad-ciencias.pt, p. s.v. apenas