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dançar

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Etymology and origin of the Portuguese word dançar

Confidence
Probable
Formation
Borrowing
First attested
1300s More words from the 14th century
Borrowed from
Old French dancier

Pronunciation

  • Brazil: /dɐ̃ˈsa(ʁ)/, [dɐ̃ˈsa(h)][1]
  • São-Paulo: /dɐ̃ˈsa(ɾ)/[1]
  • Rio-de-Janeiro: /dɐ̃ˈsa(ʁ)/, [dɐ̃ˈsa(χ)][1]
  • Caipira: /dɐ̃ˈsa(ɻ)/[1]

Forms

dançar (first-person singular present danço, first-person singular preterite dancei, past participle dançado)[1] Houaiss records damçar and dancar in the 15th century.[2] The spelling dansar was long in use beside dançar: Silva Bastos (1912) heads the word dansar and calls dançar the form preferred by good authors.[3][1][4]

Etymology

It is borrowed from Old French dancier, the old form of French danser, which is recorded about 1170.[2][5][6][7] The DLP and Porto Editora name the modern French verb as the source.[8][9] Wiktionary instead has it inherited, through the Galician-Portuguese stage, from Vulgar Latin *dantiō.[1] The noun dança is recorded earlier than the verb, in the cantigas of about 1250.[10][5]

The French verb was proper to the langue d'oïl and spread from northern France to the neighbouring languages: Italian danzare, Spanish danzar and the English word dance.[11][10] Its own origin is disputed.[2][10] Houaiss sets out three proposals: the Old High German dansōn (“to pull, draw”), as if from the round dance in which a dancer is drawn into the ring; the Frankish *dintjan (“to move to and fro”), which Cunha and Porto Editora accept; and a Vulgar Latin verb *deantiō, a variant of *abantiō (“to advance”).[2][5][9] Corominas notes that the Old High German etymology, Diez's, had to be given up, and that the debate has led to no satisfactory result.[10] Wiktionary connects the Vulgar Latin verb with Proto-West Germanic *þansōn, and calls its origin uncertain and highly debated.[12]

Corominas himself thought it possibly Hispano-Arabic: in the Arabic of Spain the word named popular dances and could be explained from a Semitic root meaning “to be dirty, indecent”, so that it may first have named the tavern dances of Muslim Andalusia and taken on a noble sense in southern France, where Hispano-Arabic dancers were popular in the time of the troubadours.[13][10] Corriente, Pereira and Vicente, granting a Provençal origin, suggest an Andalusian Arabic noun meaning “joke, mockery” or a verb meaning “to rejoice; to play”, derived from the name of the sub-Saharan lands whose people were known as good dancers.[14]

Earliest recorded meaning

Houaiss and Cunha date the verb to the 14th century.[2][5] One of the Galician-Portuguese lais has ledas seiamus oy mays / e dancemus “let us be merry today and dance”, and further on cantemos bem / e dancemos “let us sing well and dance”.[15][16]

Semantic evolution

In French and in the southern Romance languages the word first named the stately dances of the court and the more refined group dances, as against the popular dances called by the descendants of Latin ballare (Portuguese bailar).[2][10] Morais (1789) defines it as moving the body and limbs in time to music, on the ground or on the tightrope.[17] Caldas Aulete adds the figurative senses of things that sway, jump or spin, such as a top or the plates on a table that is struck.[18] Brazilian slang has made dançar mean to come off badly, to miss one's chance, to be arrested and, of a plan, to fall through.[2][6][8][1]

Timeline

  • c. 1250 – the noun dança in the cantigas.[10]
  • 14th century – first record of the verb.[2][5]
  • c. 1430 – the Horto do Esposo (copied 1390–1437) uses the verb.[19]
  • 15th century – the spellings damçar and dancar.[2]
  • 1569 – Cardoso renders it by Latin salto and tripudio.[20]
  • 1712–1728 – Bluteau discusses an Arabic, a German and a Latin etymology.[21]
  • 1789 – Morais defines it as moving in time to music.[17]
  • 1871 – Vieira derives it from Old High German dansõn.[22]
  • 1912 – Silva Bastos still heads the word dansar.[3]

Meanings

Verb

  1. (intransitive) To dance, to move the body in rhythm, usually to music: Dançaram até de madrugada.[2][6][1]
  2. (transitive) To perform a particular dance: Aprendeu a dançar a valsa com a avó.[2][23]
  3. To move to and fro, to sway or oscillate: Os ramos dançavam com o vento forte.[2][6][1]
  4. To fit too loosely, of clothes, shoes or a key in a lock.[2][9]
  5. (Brazil, informal) To come off badly, to fail; to miss an opportunity.[2][6][8][1]
  6. (Brazil, slang) To be arrested.[2][8]
  7. (Brazil, informal) To fall through, not to happen: O passeio de domingo dançou por causa da chuva.[2]

Word family

  • dança
  • dançador
  • dançante
  • dançarino
  • dançável
  • contradança
  • dançadeira
  • danceteria
  • French danser
  • Spanish danzar

Usage notes

Bluteau derived the verb from an Arabic tanza or a German Dantzen “to dance”, and reported an attempt to derive it from Latin densare, from the fullers who tread the cloth.[21] Vieira (1871) took it from Old High German dansõn “to stretch”.[22]

The phrase dançar conforme a música “to dance to the music” means to adapt oneself to the circumstances.[2][1]

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 q Houaiss, Antônio; Villar, Mauro de Salles (2001), Dicionário Houaiss da língua portuguesa, Rio de Janeiro: Objetiva, p. s.v. dançar
  3. ^ a b Silva Bastos, José Timóteo da (1912), Diccionario etymologico, prosodico e orthographico da lingua portugueza, Lisboa: Parceria António Maria Pereira, p. s.v. dançar
  4. ^ NEHiLP – Núcleo de Apoio à Pesquisa em Etimologia e História da Língua Portuguesa, Universidade de São Paulo, DELPo: Dicionário Etimológico da Língua Portuguesa (online database), p. s.v. dançar
  5. ^ a b c d e Cunha, Antônio Geraldo da (2010), Dicionário etimológico da língua portuguesa, 4th ed., Rio de Janeiro: Lexikon, p. s.v. dançar
  6. ^ a b c d e Ferreira, Aurélio Buarque de Holanda, Novo dicionário Aurélio da língua portuguesa, digital edition, p. s.v. dançar
  7. ^ Nascentes, Antenor (1966), Dicionário etimológico resumido, Rio de Janeiro: Instituto Nacional do Livro, p. s.v. dançar
  8. ^ a b c d 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. dançar
  9. ^ a b c Porto Editora (2013), Grande Dicionário da Língua Portuguesa, Porto: Porto Editora, p. 2669
  10. ^ a b c d e f g Corominas, Joan; Pascual, José A. (1980–1991), Diccionario crítico etimológico castellano e hispánico, 6 vols., Madrid: Gredos, p. 2, 423
  11. ^ Rey, Alain, ed. (1992), Dictionnaire historique de la langue française, Paris: Le Robert, p. s.v. danser
  12. ^ Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org, p. s.v. dantiare
  13. ^ Corominas, Joan (1973), Breve diccionario etimológico de la lengua castellana, 3rd ed., Madrid: Gredos, p. s.v. danzar
  14. ^ Corriente, Federico; Pereira, Christophe; Vicente, Ángeles (2019), Dictionnaire des emprunts ibéro-romans: emprunts à l'arabe et aux langues du monde islamique (Encyclopédie linguistique d'Al-Andalus 3), Berlin: De Gruyter, p. s.v. dançar
  15. ^ 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. dançar
  16. ^ 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. dançar
  17. ^ 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, 360
  18. ^ 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. dançar
  19. ^ Centro de Linguística da Universidade de Lisboa, CTA – Corpus de Textos Antigos, https://teitok.clul.ul.pt/cta, p. s.v. dançar
  20. ^ Cardoso, Jerónimo (1569–1570), Dictionarium ex lusitanico in latinum sermonem, Lisboa: João Álvares (CLP transcription, Universidade de Aveiro), p. s.v. dançar
  21. ^ 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. dançar
  22. ^ 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, 699
  23. ^ Dicionário Priberam da Língua Portuguesa, Lisboa: Priberam Informática, https://dicionario.priberam.org, p. s.v. dançar

Related etymologies

Cite this entry

“Dançar.” Etymologically, 15 Nov. 2026, etymologically.com/pt/dan%C3%A7ar. Accessed 16 Nov. 2026.

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