bicho

Forms

bicho m (plural bichos)^[1] Old Galician-Portuguese wrote bicho, bescho and bischo in the 14th century.^[2][3]

Etymology

It is inherited from Vulgar Latin *bīstius, a masculine form of Latin bēstia (“beast, animal”).^{[2][3][4][5][1]} Corominas notes that a masculine bestius is found in writers of the 3rd and 4th centuries such as Commodian.^[6][7] Houaiss holds the masculine Old Galician-Portuguese bicho to be older than the feminine bicha (16th century), and the same Latin noun, through the form besta, gave besta “beast, beast of burden” (13th century); from one source, they have grown apart in meaning.^[2][1]

How the Latin form became the Portuguese word is much debated.^[6] Cornu thought it proved by the old form Old Galician-Portuguese bescha and the variants bixcho and bixstho;^[7] Menéndez Pidal supposed a stage *beicho;^[7] García de Diego accepted that the ⟨s⟩ shows a link with the Latin word but doubted whether it or bestula was the base.^[7] Machado sees no development from bescho to bischo, only divergent forms.^[4] Meyer-Lübke derived the word from the classical noun, rejecting the etyma proposed by Diez and by Caix.^[7]

Related forms are Spanish bicho, which Corominas thinks Spanish took from Portuguese, Galician bicha, Italian biscia (“snake”) and Old French bisse.^[4][6][1]

Earliest recorded meaning

Cunha and Houaiss date the word to the 14th century.^[2][3] Machado quotes bischo in that century with the sense “worm, insect”: e outrosi as bestas bravas, e os bischos, e as serpentes da terra “and also the wild beasts, and the creeping things, and the serpents of the earth”, in the Inéditos de Alcobaça.^[4] Corominas adds bescho in the Vidas dos Padres de Mérida of about 1400 and the derivative bischoco already in the Cantigas de Santa Maria.^[6]

Semantic evolution

In the 15th century bicho is a small, unclean creature, and the feminine bicha appears in 1513 in a letter of Afonso de Albuquerque about an island full of snakes and bichas.^[4] Bluteau (1712–1728) defines the word as any insect bred in bodies, the earth, trees or fruit, and in the 18th century Francisco José Freire still objected to calling a four-footed animal bicho.^[8][4] The wider sense “any animal except man” won all the same, along with pejorative uses for an ugly, rough or insignificant person.^[2][5]

Brazilian Portuguese made the word a familiar form of address, bicho “mate”, and used it for a bold, energetic person, for a freshman and for cane spirit; in football a bicho is the bonus paid to players after a win.^[2][5][1] In Brazil bicho also means the jogo do bicho, the illegal lottery in which numbers are tied to animals;^[2][1] ver que bicho dá is to wait for the draw, and so, figuratively, to wait and see.^[2][1]

Timeline

• 1300s – bischo “worm, insect” in the Inéditos de Alcobaça.^[4][3]
• c. 1400 – bescho in the Vidas dos Padres de Mérida.^[6]
• c. 1430 – bicho in the Horto do Esposo (copied 1390–1437).^[9]
• 1513 – first record of the feminine bicha, in a letter of Afonso de Albuquerque.^[4]
• 1578 – first record of Spanish bicho, which Corominas thinks came from Portuguese.^[6]
• 1712–1728 – Bluteau defines bicho as any kind of insect.^[8]

Meanings

Noun

1. An animal, any creature other than man; especially a wild beast.^[2][5][1]
2. A bug: an insect, larva or worm, especially one that eats wood, fruit, grain, cloth or paper.^[2][5][1]
3. A monster used to frighten children.^[2]
4. (derogatory) An ugly, unpleasant or surly person; a person of no importance.^[2][5][1]
5. An expert, someone very good at what they do.^[2][5]
6. An apprentice; a freshman at school or university.^[2][5]
7. (Brazil, informal) Used to address a friend: Calma, bicho, já chego.^[2][5][1]
8. (Brazil, informal) A bold, energetic person.^[2][5]
9. (Brazil, informal) Cane spirit, cachaça.^[2]
10. (sports) A bonus paid to players and the coach after a win.^[2][5]
11. (Brazil, gambling, informal) The jogo do bicho, an illegal lottery.^[2][1]

Word family

• bichinho
• bichão
• bicharada
• bicharoco
• bicheira
• bichado
• bicho-da-seda
• bicho-de-pé
• bicho-carpinteiro

Related words

• bicha
• besta
• Latin bestia
• Spanish bicho

References

1. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s Houaiss, Antônio; Villar, Mauro de Salles (2001), Dicionário Houaiss da língua portuguesa, Rio de Janeiro: Objetiva, p. s.v. bicho
3. ^ a b c d Cunha, Antônio Geraldo da (2010), Dicionário etimológico da língua portuguesa, 4th ed., Rio de Janeiro: Lexikon, p. s.v. bicho
4. ^ a b c d e f g h Machado, José Pedro (1987), Dicionário etimológico da língua portuguesa, 4th ed., 5 vols., Lisboa: Livros Horizonte, p. s.v. bicho
5. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k Ferreira, Aurélio Buarque de Holanda, Novo dicionário Aurélio da língua portuguesa, digital edition, p. s.v. bicho
6. ^ a b c d e f Corominas, Joan; Pascual, José A. (1980–1991), Diccionario crítico etimológico castellano e hispánico, 6 vols., Madrid: Gredos, p. 1, 580
7. ^ a b c d e Nascentes, Antenor (1955), Dicionário etimológico da língua portuguesa, vol. 1: Nomes comuns, Rio de Janeiro (1st ed. 1932, preface by W. Meyer-Lübke), p. 70
8. ^ a b Bluteau, Raphael (1712–1728), Vocabulario portuguez e latino, 8 vols. + 2 supplement vols., Coimbra / Lisboa (CLP transcription, Universidade de Aveiro), p. s.v. bicho
9. ^ Centro de Linguística da Universidade de Lisboa, CTA – Corpus de Textos Antigos, https://teitok.clul.ul.pt/cta, p. s.v. bicho