Etymology and origin of the Portuguese word apor
- Confidence
- Established
- Formation
- Inherited
- First attested
- 1200s Cantigas de Santa Maria, spelt apõer More words from the 13th century
- Inherited from
- Latin appono
- Ultimate origin
- Latin pōnō
Etymology tree
Pronunciation
Forms
apor (first-person singular present aponho, first-person singular preterite apus, past participle aposto)[1] Old Galician-Portuguese wrote apõer and apoer, with forms such as apõedes, apõen, aponna and aposeran.[2][3][4][5]
Etymology
It is inherited from Latin appōnō (“to place near, set beside; to add”), written Old Galician-Portuguese apõer in the oldest texts, also without the tilde.[6][5][3][1] Nascentes considers the word semi-learned.[7] The Latin verb is formed from ad- and pōnō (“to put”),[8][1] and the Portuguese verb is conjugated like pôr.[9][10]
The same Latin verb is Galician apoñer, Spanish aponer, Italian apporre and Romanian apune,[1][11] and in the French of the Jura and the Alps it survives as appondre "to join end to end".[12]
Earliest recorded meaning
In the 13th-century Cantigas de Santa Maria the verb means "to impute, to lay (a charge) on someone": porque ll'apõyan que matara a ssa moller "because they accused him of having killed his wife" (cantiga 213).[2][3] The cantigas d'escarnho use it in apoer culpa "to lay the blame" and apoer mal prez "to give a bad name".[2][13]
Semantic evolution
The medieval sense "to attribute, impute" is found in the Crónica Troiana (apões formosos nomẽes a a tua culpa "you give fair names to your fault") and was recorded again in 2006 at Carragosa, in the district of Bragança.[2][14] The standard language now uses the verb in the physical sense of the Latin, "to put beside or on, to add", above all of affixing a signature, a stamp or a fingerprint to a document.[6][15] In rural Portugal it also means to yoke oxen or cows to a cart or plough.[16][17][14] In grammar it means to use a word as an aposto, in apposition.[6][10]
Timeline
- 13th century – apõer “to impute” in the Cantigas de Santa Maria.[3][2]
- c. 1430 – apoer in the Horto do Esposo (witness 1390–1437).[18]
- 1550 – the participle aposto in a private letter.[19]
- 1600s – first record of aposta “bet”, the participle used as a noun.[5]
- 1952 – a survey in Portugal records apor “to yoke oxen to a cart”.[14]
Meanings
Verb
- To put next to or on top of; to juxtapose, apply: Apôs uma etiqueta em cada frasco.[6][20]
- To affix a signature (assinatura), seal or fingerprint to a document, law or treaty.[6][9][15]
- To add (one thing to another): Apôs duas notas ao relatório.[6][9]
- (formal) To yoke or hitch (oxen to a cart, a horse to the shafts).[6][16]
- (grammar) To use (a noun phrase) in apposition.[6][10]
- (regional, Bragança) To impute, attribute.[14]
Word family
- aposto
- aposta
- apostar
Related words
Usage notes
Aurélio and Aulete warn against confusing apôs "he affixed" with the adverb após "after", and the participle aposto /ô/ with aposto "I bet", from apostar.[9][20]
References
- ^ a b c d e f g h Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
- ^ a b c d e 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. apõer
- ^ a b c d Machado, José Pedro (1987), Dicionário etimológico da língua portuguesa, 4th ed., 5 vols., Lisboa: Livros Horizonte, p. s.v. apor
- ^ Universo Cantigas: Glosario da poesía medieval profana galego-portuguesa, A Coruña: Instituto da Lingua e Literatura (ILLA), Universidade da Coruña, https://www.universocantigas.gal, p. s.v. apoer
- ^ a b c Cunha, Antônio Geraldo da (2010), Dicionário etimológico da língua portuguesa, 4th ed., Rio de Janeiro: Lexikon, p. s.v. apor
- ^ a b c d e f g h Houaiss, Antônio; Villar, Mauro de Salles (2001), Dicionário Houaiss da língua portuguesa, Rio de Janeiro: Objetiva, p. s.v. apor
- ^ Nascentes, Antenor (1966), Dicionário etimológico resumido, Rio de Janeiro: Instituto Nacional do Livro, p. s.v. apor
- ^ Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press, p. s.v. appōnō
- ^ a b c d Ferreira, Aurélio Buarque de Holanda, Novo dicionário Aurélio da língua portuguesa, digital edition, p. s.v. apor
- ^ a b c Michaelis: Moderno Dicionário da Língua Portuguesa, São Paulo: Melhoramentos (online as Michaelis Dicionário Brasileiro da Língua Portuguesa, https://michaelis.uol.com.br), p. s.v. apor
- ^ 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. aponer
- ^ Rey, Alain, ed. (1992), Dictionnaire historique de la langue française, Paris: Le Robert, p. s.v. appondre
- ^ Lopes, Graça Videira; Ferreira, Manuel Pedro et al. (2011–), Cantigas Medievais Galego-Portuguesas [online database], Lisboa: Instituto de Estudos Medievais, FCSH/NOVA, https://cantigas.fcsh.unl.pt, p. s.v. apoer
- ^ a b c d Instituto da Lingua Galega, Tesouro do léxico patrimonial galego e portugués (TLPGP), Santiago de Compostela: Universidade de Santiago de Compostela, https://ilg.usc.gal/tesouro, p. s.v. apor
- ^ a b 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. apor
- ^ a b Dicionário Priberam da Língua Portuguesa, Lisboa: Priberam Informática, https://dicionario.priberam.org, p. s.v. apor
- ^ Porto Editora (2013), Grande Dicionário da Língua Portuguesa, Porto: Porto Editora, p. 813
- ^ Centro de Linguística da Universidade de Lisboa, CTA – Corpus de Textos Antigos, https://teitok.clul.ul.pt/cta, p. s.v. apoer
- ^ CLUL (ed.) (2014), P.S. Post Scriptum: Arquivo Digital de Escrita Quotidiana em Portugal e Espanha na Época Moderna, Lisboa: Centro de Linguística da Universidade de Lisboa, http://ps.clul.ul.pt, p. s.v. apor
- ^ a b Aulete, Francisco Júlio Caldas, Dicionário contemporâneo da língua portuguesa (1st ed. 1881), online as Aulete Digital, Rio de Janeiro: Lexikon, https://aulete.com.br, p. s.v. apor
Related etymologies
Cite this entry
“Apor.” Etymologically, 15 Nov. 2026, etymologically.com/pt/apor. Accessed 16 Nov. 2026.
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