deixar

Forms

deixar (first-person singular present deixo, first-person singular preterite deixei, past participle deixado)^[1] The medieval form was leixar, far more frequent than the forms with d-.^[2] Houaiss has leixe in 1091 and 15th-century forms such as lejxarom, leyxedes and lleixou.^[3] Cunha dates dexar and deyxar to the 13th century and deixar to the 14th.^[2] Carolina Michaëlis, in her glossary of the Cancioneiro da Ajuda, held instead that leixar is the only old form, and that deixar rose from popular speech in the 15th century.^[4]

Etymology

It is inherited from Latin laxō (“to widen, loosen; to let go”), whose medieval outcome was Old Galician-Portuguese leixar.^[2][5][1][6] In Medieval Latin the verb mostly meant “to let, leave”.^[5] The Latin verb is formed on laxus (“loose, wide”).^[7][1] The learned laxar is a doublet.^[1]

The initial /d/ has no agreed explanation.^[2][6] The REW calls the d- forms unexplained and suggests the influence of dō (“to give”), as do García de Diego and the DLE.^[8][9][10] Michaëlis derived the word from Late Latin *dēlaxō, with the /l/ treated as if it stood between vowels and lost, as in rezar.^[4] Nascentes reports that Meyer-Lübke saw phonetic difficulties in that compound.^[11] Wiktionary allows either the compound or the influence of the preposition de.^[1]

The same shift is found in Galician deixar, Asturian dexar, Spanish dejar and Catalan deixar, while French laisser, Italian lasciare, Occitan laissar and Romanian lăsa keep the /l/.^[8][1] The old Spanish form was Old Spanish lexar, recorded from 1055, and Old Spanish dexar appears about 1200.^[12]

De Vaan derives the Latin adjective from an Indo-European word meaning “weak, faint”, related to langueō (“to be faint”);^[13][1] Wiktionary gives it as Proto-Indo-European *(s)leg-s-ós.^[13][1]

Earliest recorded meaning

Houaiss's earliest dates come from Machado's Latin charters: leixe in 1091 and the Latinised dexare in 1209.^[3][5] In Galician-Portuguese texts a charter of 1258–1261 has non leixaran razoando por ante o Juiz “they had not stopped pleading before the judge”, and the Cantigas de Santa Maria say of a man that he leyxou seu irmão “left his brother”.^[4] A cantiga by Gil Perez Conde has the sense “to allow”: non vos leixarei entrar “I will not let you in”.^[4]

Semantic evolution

The medieval texts already have the main senses of today: to let go, to abandon, to refrain from (leixar de), and to allow.^[4] In the cantigas d'amigo leixar a with an infinitive stood where today one says deixar de.^[4] Notarial documents of Noia (1403–1443) use leixar with desembargar for handing over land, and a 15th-century register of Rianjo already writes deixo.^[4][14] Morais (1813) records “to abstain” (deixar de fazer), “to permit” and “to bequeath”.^[15] The modern dictionaries add “to put off”, “to omit” and “to leave alone”.^[1][16]

Timeline

• 1091 – leixe in a Latin charter.^[3]
• 1209 – dexare in a Latin charter.^[5]
• 13th century – dexar and deyxar.^[2]
• 1258–1261 – leixaran in a charter.^[4]
• 13th century – leyxou seu irmão in the Cantigas de Santa Maria.^[4]
• 14th century – first record of the spelling deixar.^[2][5]
• c. 1500 – deixar in the Vida de Santo Agostinho (witness of 1480–1510).^[17]
• 1813 – Morais records the senses “to abstain”, “to permit” and “to bequeath”.^[15]
• 1873 – first record of the noun deixa.^[2]

Meanings

Verb

1. To leave, go away from (a place): Deixou Lisboa aos vinte anos.^[5][18][1]
2. To leave, abandon, part from (a person, a job, a group): Deixou a banda no ano passado.^[5][19][1]
3. To let go of, release.^[18][16]
4. To leave (something) somewhere; to leave behind: Deixei o guarda-chuva no carro.^[19][1]
5. To let, allow: Deixa-me passar.^[1][20]
6. (with de and an infinitive) To stop doing; not to do: Deixou de fumar.^[1][15]
7. To bequeath.^[1][16]
8. To put off, postpone: Deixa isso para amanhã.^[1][16]
9. To leave (someone) in a state; to make (someone) feel: A notícia deixou-a triste.^[1][20]
10. To leave alone, not bother.^[1][16]

Word family

• deixa

Related words

• desleixar
• laxo
• desleixo
• laxar
• Latin laxus
• Galician deixar
• Spanish dejar

Usage notes

With an object and an infinitive, “to let someone do something”, the plain infinitive is the norm; the personal infinitive in this construction is proscribed.^[1]

References

1. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s t u v w Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g Cunha, Antônio Geraldo da (2010), Dicionário etimológico da língua portuguesa, 4th ed., Rio de Janeiro: Lexikon, p. s.v. deixar
3. ^ a b c Houaiss, Antônio; Villar, Mauro de Salles (2001), Dicionário Houaiss da língua portuguesa, Rio de Janeiro: Objetiva, p. s.v. leixar
4. ^ a b c d e f g h i 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. leixar
5. ^ a b c d e f g Houaiss, Antônio; Villar, Mauro de Salles (2001), Dicionário Houaiss da língua portuguesa, Rio de Janeiro: Objetiva, p. s.v. deixar
6. ^ a b Nascentes, Antenor (1966), Dicionário etimológico resumido, Rio de Janeiro: Instituto Nacional do Livro, p. s.v. deixar
7. ^ Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press, p. s.v. laxo
8. ^ a b Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter, p. 4955
9. ^ García de Diego, Vicente (1985), Diccionario etimológico español e hispánico, 2nd ed., Madrid: Espasa-Calpe (1st ed. 1954), p. s.v. laxare
10. ^ 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. dejar
11. ^ Nascentes, Antenor (1955), Dicionário etimológico da língua portuguesa, vol. 1: Nomes comuns, Rio de Janeiro (1st ed. 1932, preface by W. Meyer-Lübke), p. 150
12. ^ Corominas, Joan; Pascual, José A. (1980–1991), Diccionario crítico etimológico castellano e hispánico, 6 vols., Madrid: Gredos, p. 2, 435
13. ^ a b de Vaan, Michiel (2008), Etymological Dictionary of Latin and the other Italic Languages, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 7, Leiden; Boston: Brill
14. ^ 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. deixar
15. ^ a b c Silva, António de Morais (1813), Diccionario da lingua portugueza, 2nd ed., 2 vols., Lisboa: Typographia Lacerdina, p. 1, 523
16. ^ a b c d e Dicionário Priberam da Língua Portuguesa, Lisboa: Priberam Informática, https://dicionario.priberam.org, p. s.v. deixar
17. ^ Centro de Linguística da Universidade de Lisboa, CTA – Corpus de Textos Antigos, https://teitok.clul.ul.pt/cta, p. s.v. deixar
18. ^ a b Ferreira, Aurélio Buarque de Holanda, Novo dicionário Aurélio da língua portuguesa, digital edition, p. s.v. deixar
19. ^ 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. deixar
20. ^ a b 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. deixar