bom

Forms

bom (feminine boa, masculine plural bons, feminine plural boas, comparable, comparative melhor, superlative o melhor or ótimo or boníssimo, diminutive bonzinho, augmentative bonzão)^[1] Old Galician-Portuguese wrote bõo, boo, bom, bon, and in the feminine bõa, boa;^[2][3] Houaiss also records búú(s), boons (1325) and boom.^[2][3] Michaëlis noted that the cantigas used the two-syllable bõo on its own or after a noun, and the shortened bom before a noun, while bô (from boo), common in the Minho, Galicia and Beira Alta, was not used by the troubadours.^[3]

Etymology

It is inherited from Latin bonus (“good”), written Old Galician-Portuguese bõo in the oldest texts.^[2][4][1][5] The old form was a word of two syllables, and Vieira explains the loss of the Latin /n/ between vowels as the usual syncope.^[4][6]

The same Latin word is Galician bo, Spanish bueno, Catalan bo, French bon, Italian buono and Romanian bun.^[7][1] The Latin adjective is Old Latin duonus, earlier duenos, from *dwenos; its further origin is uncertain, and de Vaan suggests *duh₂-eno- with a question mark.^[8][1]

Earliest recorded meaning

Galician-Portuguese notarial documents have the word from 1228 (e seya per scripcion de bõos homees “and let it be in the writing of good men”); eu de meu bom cor “I, of my own good will” follows in 1271.^[9] The bõos homees of these documents were men of good standing who could act as witnesses or arbiters, a sense that the notarial books of Noia still have in 1434.^[9][3]

Semantic evolution

The medieval adjective already covered goodness of quality and of character: the Miragres de Santiago call a knight moi boo and speak of moy boo vino “very good wine”.^[3] Cardoso (1569) and Pereira (1697) gloss it with Latin bonus and probus.^[10][11] Morais (1789) lists the senses “useful, wholesome”, “morally right”, “favourable” (of a wind), “fair” (of the weather) and “large” (huma boa hora “a good hour”).^[12] As an interjection of approval or surprise it is in Silva Bastos (1912) and Figueiredo (1899).^[13][14]

Brazilian informal use adds “brave” and “just right”, and ironic uses such as boa bisca “a fine one”.^[2]

Timeline

• 1228 – bõos homees in a Galician-Portuguese notarial document.^[9]
• 13th century – bõo and bom in the cantigas.^[2][3]
• 1325 – Houaiss's record of the plural boons.^[2]
• 1569 – Cardoso glosses bom with Latin bonus.^[10]
• 1789 – Morais lists the senses of the adjective.^[12]

Meanings

Adjective

1. good; having the qualities proper to its kind or function: um bom motor.^[2][15][16]
2. Morally good, kind, generous: Tem um coração bom.^[2][15][1]
3. Skilled, competent: uma boa enfermeira.^[2][15][17]
4. Pleasant to the taste, tasty.^[2][16][1]
5. Favourable; profitable; safe, reliable (of an investment, a contract).^[2][15][18]
6. Well again, recovered (from an illness).^[2]
7. Large, considerable: uma boa parte do dinheiro.^[2][1]

Noun

1. A good person; the good (as opposed to the bad).^[2][17]
2. (Portugal, school slang) A grade between suficiente and muito bom.^[16]

Interjection

1. well; expressing approval, or used to change the subject or sum up: Bom, vamos embora.^[2][1][18]

Word family

• bonzinho
• bonzão
• bom dia
• boa tarde
• boa noite

Related words

• bem
• bondade
• bônus
• Latin bonus
• Spanish bueno

Usage notes

The comparative is melhor and the superlative ótimo or boníssimo.^[1][18] Estraviz records the interjection bô as the same as bom.^[19]

References

1. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o Houaiss, Antônio; Villar, Mauro de Salles (2001), Dicionário Houaiss da língua portuguesa, Rio de Janeiro: Objetiva, p. s.v. bom
3. ^ 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. bõo
4. ^ a b Machado, José Pedro (1987), Dicionário etimológico da língua portuguesa, 4th ed., 5 vols., Lisboa: Livros Horizonte, p. s.v. bom
5. ^ 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. bom
6. ^ 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, 789
7. ^ Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter, p. 1208
8. ^ de Vaan, Michiel (2008), Etymological Dictionary of Latin and the other Italic Languages, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 7, Leiden; Boston: Brill
9. ^ a b c 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. bom
10. ^ a b Cardoso, Jerónimo (1569–1570), Dictionarium ex lusitanico in latinum sermonem, Lisboa: João Álvares (CLP transcription, Universidade de Aveiro), p. s.v. bom
11. ^ Pereira, Bento (1697), Thesouro da lingoa portuguesa, in the 1697 edition of his Prosodia (1st ed. 1647; CLP transcription, Universidade de Aveiro), p. s.v. bom
12. ^ a b 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, 188
13. ^ Silva Bastos, José Timóteo da (1912), Diccionario etymologico, prosodico e orthographico da lingua portugueza, Lisboa: Parceria António Maria Pereira, p. s.v. bom
14. ^ Figueiredo, Cândido de (1899), Novo diccionário da língua portuguesa, 1st ed., 2 vols., Lisboa: Tavares Cardoso & Irmão, p. s.v. bom
15. ^ a b c d Ferreira, Aurélio Buarque de Holanda, Novo dicionário Aurélio da língua portuguesa, digital edition, p. s.v. bom
16. ^ a b c Porto Editora (2013), Grande Dicionário da Língua Portuguesa, Porto: Porto Editora, p. 1469
17. ^ a b Dicionário Priberam da Língua Portuguesa, Lisboa: Priberam Informática, https://dicionario.priberam.org, p. s.v. bom
18. ^ 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. bom
19. ^ Estraviz, Isaac Alonso, Dicionário Estraviz, https://estraviz.org, p. s.v. bo