dívida

Forms

dívida f (plural dívidas)^[1] Medieval spellings include deveda (1255), devida, deuida (1325), diveda and divida;^[2][3] debida appears in 1471.^[2][3] Regional Portuguese also has díveda.^[4]

Etymology

It is inherited from Latin dēbita, the neuter plural of dēbitum (“debt”), taken as a feminine singular, and in the oldest texts it is written Old Galician-Portuguese deveda and Old Galician-Portuguese devida.^{[2][3][5][6][1]} Medieval Latin also used the plural form as a feminine noun meaning “debt”.^[7] The Latin noun is the past participle of dēbeō (“to owe”), contracted from a compound meaning “I hold away from someone, I withhold”, of dē and habeō (“to have, hold”).^[8][1] Wiktionary traces the simple verb to Proto-Indo-European *gʰeh₁bʰ- (“to grab, take”).^[1]

The same Latin word is Spanish deuda.^[9] The learned débito is a doublet taken from the Latin singular.^[1][10] Nascentes explains the modern form as coming through the old Old Galician-Portuguese deuida; he notes that the Testament of Afonso II stresses the word on the first syllable, and that Cornu explained the stressed ⟨i⟩ by the influence of the following syllable.^[9]

Earliest recorded meaning

Houaiss dates the first record, spelt deveda, to 1255, from Cunha's index of medieval Portuguese.^[2] In the cantigas the word appears in a satire about an old debt: divida velha que ela divia “an old debt that she owed”.^[11] From the start it means a sum or thing owed.^[2][3]

Semantic evolution

Morais (1813) gives the sense “obligation to pay a sum of money or other goods”, the money or thing owed, and the figurative ter dívida a Deus “to be indebted to God”, with the phrases contrair, pagar and cobrar dívidas.^[12] The moral sense, a duty of gratitude for a favour received, is now as common as the financial one.^[2][10][13] The language of public finance added dívida pública, dívida externa, dívida flutuante and dívida consolidada, and the language of accounts dívida ativa and dívida passiva.^[14][5][6] Several dictionaries also give the senses “sin, fault” and “an offence awaiting revenge”.^[15][5][13]

Timeline

• 1255 – first record, spelt deveda.^[2]
• 1325 – the spelling deuida.^[2]
• 1300s – the form dívida appears.^[2]
• 1471 – the Latinising spelling debida.^[2]
• 1542 – divida in a private letter.^[16]
• 1813 – Morais records the financial and figurative senses.^[12]
• 1899 – Figueiredo derives the word from Latin debita, plural of debitum.^[17]

Meanings

Noun

1. A debt, what one owes, especially a sum of money: Pagou a dívida em três prestações.^{[2][10][5][1]}
2. A moral obligation, a debt of gratitude: Tenho uma dívida com os meus professores.^{[2][10][13][1]}
3. Failure to meet an obligation; the state of being in debt (estar em dívida).^[2][14]
4. (law) Any obligation to give or do something.^[2][15]
5. (figurative) A sin, fault.^[15][5][13]
6. An offence for which revenge is expected.^[5]

Word family

• endividar

Related words

• debitado
• debitar
• devedor
• dever
• débito
• Latin dēbitum
• Spanish deuda

Usage notes

Common phrases are dívida pública “national debt”, dívida externa “foreign debt”, dívida de honra “debt of honour” and dívida de gratidão “debt of gratitude”.^[10][13][6] The noun is stressed on the first syllable;^[10] divida, stressed on the second, is a form of the verb dividir.^[10]

References

1. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ 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. dívida
3. ^ a b c d Cunha, Antônio Geraldo da (2010), Dicionário etimológico da língua portuguesa, 4th ed., Rio de Janeiro: Lexikon, p. s.v. dever
4. ^ Instituto da Lingua Galega, Tesouro do léxico patrimonial galego e portugués (TLPGP), Santiago de Compostela: Universidade de Santiago de Compostela, https://ilg.usc.gal/tesouro, p. s.v. dívida
5. ^ a b c d e f Dicionário Priberam da Língua Portuguesa, Lisboa: Priberam Informática, https://dicionario.priberam.org, p. s.v. dívida
6. ^ a b c 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. dívida
7. ^ Niermeyer, J. F. (1976), Mediae Latinitatis Lexicon Minus, Leiden: Brill, p. s.v. debita
8. ^ de Vaan, Michiel (2008), Etymological Dictionary of Latin and the other Italic Languages, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 7, Leiden; Boston: Brill, p. s.v. dēbeō
9. ^ a b Nascentes, Antenor (1966), Dicionário etimológico resumido, Rio de Janeiro: Instituto Nacional do Livro, p. s.v. dívida
10. ^ a b c d e f g Ferreira, Aurélio Buarque de Holanda, Novo dicionário Aurélio da língua portuguesa, digital edition, p. s.v. dívida
11. ^ Universo Cantigas: Glosario da poesía medieval profana galego-portuguesa, A Coruña: Instituto da Lingua e Literatura (ILLA), Universidade da Coruña, https://www.universocantigas.gal, p. s.v. divida
12. ^ a b Silva, António de Morais (1813), Diccionario da lingua portugueza, 2nd ed., 2 vols., Lisboa: Typographia Lacerdina, p. 1, 630
13. ^ a b c d e Porto Editora (2013), Grande Dicionário da Língua Portuguesa, Porto: Porto Editora, p. 3235
14. ^ a b 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. dívida
15. ^ 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. dívida
16. ^ 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. dívida
17. ^ Figueiredo, Cândido de (1899), Novo diccionário da língua portuguesa, 1st ed., 2 vols., Lisboa: Tavares Cardoso & Irmão, p. 457