conjurar

Forms

conjurar (first-person singular present conjuro, first-person singular preterite conjurei, past participle conjurado)^[1] Houaiss records the 14th-century spellings cõjurar and comjurar.^[2]

Etymology

It is borrowed from Latin coniūrō (“to swear together, conspire”), a learned word.^[1] Cunha dates it to the 13th century.^[2][3][4][1] The same Latin verb is Galician conxurar, Spanish conjurar, Catalan conjurar, French conjurer and Italian congiurare.^[1][5][6]

The Latin verb is formed from con- (“with, together”) and iūrō (“to swear”), from iūs (“law, right”).^[1][7] Its first sense was “to swear together”, hence “to band together, conspire”; in Late Latin it also meant “to entreat, adjure by something sacred”.^[6][7]

Earliest recorded meaning

The verb is in the Cantigas de Santa Maria of the 13th century, where it means “to beseech”: eu te conjur' e mando que a digas sen contenda “I beseech and command you to say it without dispute”, and a wife questions her husband muito e a conjurar “at length, beseeching him” to tell her whether he loved another woman.^[8] In cantiga 125 a cleric calls up devils by spells (os conjurou).^[8]

Semantic evolution

The medieval senses were the religious ones, “to beseech” and “to summon or drive out spirits”.^[8] Cardoso's dictionary of 1569 already glosses the word with Latin conspiro, and the political sense “to plot together” became the main one.^[9][2] Morais in 1789 put the exorcist's sense first, “to make conjurations”, beside “to beg insistently” and the reflexive “to join a conspiracy”.^[10] From “to drive out an evil spirit” came “to ward off a danger”, which Houaiss marks as figurative.^[2][11] The reflexive conjurar-se also means “to lament, complain of one's lot”.^[2][12] Among its derivatives, esconjurar is recorded from the 13th century and conjuração from the 15th.^[3]

Timeline

• 13th century – the Cantigas de Santa Maria use the verb for “to beseech” and for calling up devils.^[8]
• 13th century – first record of esconjurar.^[3]
• 14th century – the spellings cõjurar and comjurar.^[2]
• 15th century – first record of conjuração.^[3]
• 1569 – Cardoso glosses conjurar with Latin coniuro and conspiro.^[9]
• 1624 – conjurarão in a private letter.^[13]
• 1789 – Morais gives the senses “to exorcise”, “to beg insistently” and “to join a conspiracy”.^[10]
• 1813 – first record of conjurado.^[3]

Meanings

Verb

1. To conspire; to unite people, often under oath, for a common and usually political end;^[1] (reflexive) to join a conjuração.^[2][14][1]
2. To call people together into a plot: O capitão conjurou os soldados contra o governador.^[2][15]
3. To plot or plan something in secret against someone: conjurar a queda do ministro.^[2][15][14]
4. (also reflexive) Of things or events, to work together towards an end: Tudo se conjurava contra a viagem.^[2]
5. To rise up, rebel.^[2][15]
6. To exorcise; to drive out evil spirits; esconjurar.^[2][14][1]
7. (figurative) To avert or ward off a danger or evil.^[2][15][14]
8. To summon, invoke spirits or forces: conjurar os mortos.^[2][16]
9. To beg insistently, entreat: Conjurou o juiz a que o ouvisse.^[2][15][14]
10. (reflexive) To lament, complain.^[2][12]

Word family

• conjuração
• conjurado
• conjuratório
• esconjurar
• esconjuro

Related words

• jurar
• Latin coniūrō
• Spanish conjurar

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 p Houaiss, Antônio; Villar, Mauro de Salles (2001), Dicionário Houaiss da língua portuguesa, Rio de Janeiro: Objetiva, p. s.v. conjurar
3. ^ a b c d e Cunha, Antônio Geraldo da (2010), Dicionário etimológico da língua portuguesa, 4th ed., Rio de Janeiro: Lexikon, p. s.v. conjurar
4. ^ Nascentes, Antenor (1966), Dicionário etimológico resumido, Rio de Janeiro: Instituto Nacional do Livro, p. s.v. conjurar
5. ^ 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. conjurar
6. ^ a b Rey, Alain, ed. (1992), Dictionnaire historique de la langue française, Paris: Le Robert, p. s.v. conjurer
7. ^ a b Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press, p. s.v. coniūrō
8. ^ a b c d 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. conjurar
9. ^ a b Cardoso, Jerónimo (1569–1570), Dictionarium ex lusitanico in latinum sermonem, Lisboa: João Álvares (CLP transcription, Universidade de Aveiro), p. s.v. conjurar
10. ^ 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, 312
11. ^ 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. conjurar
12. ^ a b Dicionário Priberam da Língua Portuguesa, Lisboa: Priberam Informática, https://dicionario.priberam.org, p. s.v. conjurar
13. ^ 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. conjurar
14. ^ a b c d e 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. conjurar
15. ^ a b c d e Ferreira, Aurélio Buarque de Holanda, Novo dicionário Aurélio da língua portuguesa, digital edition, p. s.v. conjurar
16. ^ Wikcionário (Portuguese Wiktionary), pt.wiktionary.org, p. s.v. conjurar