boieiro

Forms

boieiro m (plural boieiros, feminine boieira, feminine plural boieiras)^[1] Until the 18th century it was spelt boyeiro, as Cardoso, Barbosa and Bluteau write it.^[2][3][4]

Etymology

According to Houaiss, Machado and the Porto dictionary, it is inherited from Latin boārius (“of cattle”), also written bovārius, the adjective of bōs (“ox”).^[5][6][7][8] In Medieval Latin both forms were also nouns meaning “cowherd”, as the Portuguese word is.^[9][10] Vieira, Aurélio, Michaelis and the DLP instead analyse it as from Portuguese boi + -eiro, and Wiktionary gives both: the Portuguese formation, perhaps corresponding to the Late Latin noun.^{[11][12][13][14][1]}

The REW lists it with the other Romance outcomes of the Latin word: Galician boieiro, Spanish boyero, Catalan boyer, Old French boier, Italian boaro and Romanian boar, while French bouvier was reshaped after bœuf (“ox”).^[15]

Earliest recorded meaning

Machado and Houaiss date it to 1258, when it occurs as a personal name in the Latin Inquirições, the royal inquests.^[6][5] The common noun is first recorded in Houaiss's historical forms in 1562, spelt boyeiro.^[5] Cardoso (1569) renders it with Latin bubulcus “ox-herd”, and Barbosa (1611) explains it as one who looks after oxen.^[5][2][3]

Semantic evolution

Bluteau (1712–1728) calls the boieiro a herdsman of large cattle and also uses the word for the star or constellation he cross-refers to boyeira.^[4] The constellation Boötes, which contains Arcturus, is still Boieiro.^[5][11][12] Vieira records the familiar homem boieiro for a coarse man.^[11]

In the Alentejo it describes a shepherd's crook whose top is bent at a right angle rather than curved; in Madeira it is a seabird, the same as patagarro.^[16][17][14] In Portugal it is also said of a cow on heat, “seeking the ox”.^[5][14] In north-eastern Brazil the boieiro is a player in the bumba meu boi folk play, and in Rio Grande do Sul it names a blackbird of the family Icteridae and a ranch hand who looks after the oxen he works with, as Spanish boyero does in the Plate.^[18][19]

Timeline

• 1258 – Boieiro as a personal name in the Latin Inquirições.^[6]
• 1562 – boyeiro, Houaiss's first record of the common noun.^[5]
• 1569 – Cardoso glosses boyeiro with Latin bubulcus.^[2]
• 1611 – Barbosa: “one who looks after oxen”.^[3]
• 1698 – the spelling boiero in a private letter.^[20]
• 1789 – Morais defines it as a herdsman of a drove of oxen.^[21]
• 1871 – Vieira adds the constellation and homem boieiro.^[11]

Meanings

Noun

1. A cowherd or drover: one who tends or drives oxen; boiadeiro.^[5][22][1]
2. (astronomy, capitalised) Boötes, the northern constellation that contains Arcturus.^[5][12][1]
3. (north-eastern Brazil) A player in the bumba meu boi.^[18]

Adjective

1. Relating to oxen;^[5] (Brazil) as in carro boieiro, an ox cart.^[5][14][1]
2. (Portugal, popular) Of a cow: on heat, seeking the bull.^[5][14]
3. (Alentejo) Of a shepherd's crook: with the top bent at a right angle.^[16][14]

Related words

• boi
• boiadeiro
• vaqueiro
• Latin bovārius
• Spanish boyero

Usage notes

Houaiss and Michaelis also record an adjective boieiro formed from boia and -eiro, said of a boat that floats well even in shallow water.^[5][13] Silva Bastos labels it Brazilian.^[5][13][23]

References

1. ^ a b c d e f g h i Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c Cardoso, Jerónimo (1569–1570), Dictionarium ex lusitanico in latinum sermonem, Lisboa: João Álvares (CLP transcription, Universidade de Aveiro), p. s.v. boyeiro
3. ^ a b c Barbosa, Agostinho (1611), Dictionarium lusitanicolatinum, Braga: Fructuoso Lourenço de Basto (CLP transcription, Universidade de Aveiro), p. s.v. boyeiro
4. ^ 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. boyeiro
5. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n Houaiss, Antônio; Villar, Mauro de Salles (2001), Dicionário Houaiss da língua portuguesa, Rio de Janeiro: Objetiva, p. s.v. boieiro
6. ^ a b c Machado, José Pedro (1987), Dicionário etimológico da língua portuguesa, 4th ed., 5 vols., Lisboa: Livros Horizonte, p. s.v. boieiro
7. ^ Porto Editora (2013), Grande Dicionário da Língua Portuguesa, Porto: Porto Editora, p. 1457
8. ^ Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press, p. s.v. bovarius
9. ^ Niermeyer, J. F. (1976), Mediae Latinitatis Lexicon Minus, Leiden: Brill, p. s.v. bovarius
10. ^ du Cange, Charles du Fresne, et al. (1883–1887), Glossarium mediae et infimae latinitatis, augmented ed. by Léopold Favre, Niort: L. Favre, p. s.v. boarius
11. ^ a b c d Vieira, Frei Domingos (1871–1874), Grande Diccionario Portuguez ou Thesouro da lingua portugueza, 5 vols., Porto: Ernesto Chardron e Bartholomeu H. de Moraes, p. 1, 785
12. ^ a b c Ferreira, Aurélio Buarque de Holanda, Novo dicionário Aurélio da língua portuguesa, digital edition, p. s.v. boieiro
13. ^ 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. boieiro
14. ^ a b c d e f 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. boieiro
15. ^ Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter, p. 1180
16. ^ a b Figueiredo, Cândido de (1899), Novo diccionário da língua portuguesa, 1st ed., 2 vols., Lisboa: Tavares Cardoso & Irmão, p. s.v. boieiro
17. ^ 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. boieiro
18. ^ a b Navarro, Fred (2004), Dicionário do Nordeste, São Paulo: Estação Liberdade, p. s.v. boieiro
19. ^ Schlee, Aldyr Garcia (2019), Dicionário da Cultura Pampeana Sul-Rio-Grandense, 2 vols., Pelotas: Fructos do Paiz, p. s.v. boieiro
20. ^ 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. boieiro
21. ^ Silva, António de Morais (1789), Diccionario da lingua portugueza composto pelo padre D. Rafael Bluteau, reformado, e accrescentado, 2 vols., Lisboa: Simão Thaddeo Ferreira, p. 1, 187
22. ^ Dicionário Priberam da Língua Portuguesa, Lisboa: Priberam Informática, https://dicionario.priberam.org, p. s.v. boieiro
23. ^ Silva Bastos, José Timóteo da (1912), Diccionario etymologico, prosodico e orthographico da lingua portugueza, Lisboa: Parceria António Maria Pereira, p. s.v. boieiro