crime

Forms

crime m (plural crimes)^[1]

Etymology

Houaiss and Wiktionary take it as borrowed from French crime, recorded in French from about 1165, from Latin crīmen (“accusation; crime”).^[2][1] Cunha, Nascentes, Aurélio and the DLP derive it directly from the Latin word, as a learned borrowing.^[3][4][5][6] Houaiss's oldest form, of the 13th century, is Old Galician-Portuguese crimin.^[2] The present form follows in 1321.^[2]

The Latin noun first meant “accusation, charge”, then the conduct a person was accused of, and finally “crime, offence”.^[2][7] Houaiss connects it with a family of Greek words about separating, deciding and judging, such as Ancient Greek κρίνω (krínō, “to separate, decide, judge”) and κρῖμα (krîma, “judgement”).^[2] Wiktionary explains the Latin word as cernō (“to sift”) with the suffix -men, from Proto-Italic *kreimən and Proto-Indo-European *kréymn̥, built on *krey- (“sieve”); the OLD calls the origin doubtful but gives the same analysis as a possibility.^[1][7]

The same word is Spanish crimen, Italian crimine, Catalan crim and the English word crime.^[2][1]

Earliest recorded meaning

R. Lorenzo's chronology quotes a text of 1321 that reserves for the alcaide the jurisdiction over matters “of crime” (en ffecto de crime), as against cases that are not criminal.^[8] The word was thus at first a legal term.^[8][2]

Semantic evolution

Cardoso (1569) and Pereira (1697) gloss the word with Latin crimen and scelus.^[9][10] Bluteau (1712–1728) derives it from the Greek verb for “to judge” and defines it as a capital offence against human or divine law that can be denounced to a judge; he adds that our smallest faults against God are great crimes.^[11]

Used as an adjective it means “criminal”, the opposite of “civil”, in legal phrases such as processo crime.^[12][13] Morais (1789) and Vieira (1871–1874) record it so.^[12][13] In older European Portuguese the adjective also meant “grave” and “angry-looking”, as in fazer o caso mais crime “to make the matter worse”.^[2][6]

The modern dictionaries extend the word from breaches of penal law to any act that society or morality condemns, and use it by metonymy for criminals as a group and for the life of a criminal.^[2][5][14]

Timeline

• 13th century – first record, spelt crimin.^[2]
• 1321 – crime in a legal text.^[8][2]
• 1513 – crime in the Livro dos Mártires.^[15]
• 1569 – Cardoso glosses it as Latin crimen.^[9]
• 1712–1728 – Bluteau derives it from Greek and defines it as an offence against the law.^[11]
• 1789 – Morais records the adjective “criminal”.^[12]

Meanings

Noun

1. (law) A crime; a culpable violation of the penal law, by action or omission, through intent or negligence: Foi condenado por um crime de furto.^[2][5][1]
2. Any act that society condemns for its harmful consequences; a moral or ethical transgression.^[2][5][6]
3. (figurative) A serious mistake with bad consequences; a sin, a wrong.^[2]
4. (by metonymy) Criminals as a group; organised crime.^[2][14]
5. The life of a criminal.^[2][14]

Adjective

1. (law) criminal, penal: processo crime.^[2][6][16]
2. (Portugal, dated) Grave, harmful; angry or menacing in appearance.^[2][6]

Related words

• criminal
• criminoso
• criminalidade
• incriminar
• recriminar
• Latin crīmen

Usage notes

The dictionaries record many legal phrases, such as crime capital (one punished by death), crime de lesa-majestade (against the king) and crime de lesa-pátria (against the State).^[2][16][17]

References

1. ^ a b c d e f g 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. crime
3. ^ Cunha, Antônio Geraldo da (2010), Dicionário etimológico da língua portuguesa, 4th ed., Rio de Janeiro: Lexikon, p. s.v. crime
4. ^ Nascentes, Antenor (1966), Dicionário etimológico resumido, Rio de Janeiro: Instituto Nacional do Livro, p. s.v. crime
5. ^ a b c d Ferreira, Aurélio Buarque de Holanda, Novo dicionário Aurélio da língua portuguesa, digital edition, p. s.v. crime
6. ^ 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. crime
7. ^ a b Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press, p. s.v. crīmen
8. ^ 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. crime
9. ^ a b Cardoso, Jerónimo (1569–1570), Dictionarium ex lusitanico in latinum sermonem, Lisboa: João Álvares (CLP transcription, Universidade de Aveiro), p. s.v. crime
10. ^ 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. crime
11. ^ 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. crime
12. ^ a b c 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, 348
13. ^ a b Vieira, Frei Domingos (1871–1874), Grande Diccionario Portuguez ou Thesouro da lingua portugueza, 5 vols., Porto: Ernesto Chardron e Bartholomeu H. de Moraes, p. 2, 637
14. ^ 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. crime
15. ^ Centro de Linguística da Universidade de Lisboa, CTA – Corpus de Textos Antigos, https://teitok.clul.ul.pt/cta, p. s.v. crime
16. ^ a b Porto Editora (2013), Grande Dicionário da Língua Portuguesa, Porto: Porto Editora, p. 2570
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. crime