delicioso

Forms

delicioso (feminine deliciosa, masculine plural deliciosos, feminine plural deliciosas, comparable, comparative mais delicioso, superlative o mais delicioso or deliciosíssimo, metaphonic)^[1]

Etymology

It is borrowed from Late Latin dēliciōsus (“delightful”), a learned word.^[2][3][4][1] Lewis & Short mark the Latin adjective as late, from Augustine and later writers.^[5] It is formed from dēliciae (“delight, pleasure”) and -ōsus, the same Latin word as delícia.^[1][2] Vieira, in the 19th century, explained it as the noun with the suffix -oso.^[6]

The same Latin word was borrowed as Spanish delicioso, French délicieux and Italian delizioso.^[7][1]

Earliest recorded meaning

Houaiss and Cunha date the word to the 16th century.^[2][3] Morais's dictionary quotes 16th-century prose with it in the sense “given to pleasures, living in luxury”: men who were deliciosos, delicados, lascivos and mui deliciosos em coisas de cheiros “very luxurious in perfumes”.^[8]

Semantic evolution

Bluteau (1712–1728) separates the sense “delightful”, said of things (vida deliciosa, lugar delicioso, manjar delicioso), from “given to pleasures”, said of people.^[9] Vieira (1871–1874) already marks the second sense as old.^[6] The original Caldas Aulete also lists delicioso as the name of a variety of fig.^[10] Today the word is used above all of tasty food, of delightful places and things, and of witty or amusing stories and people.^[2][10]

Timeline

• 16th century – first records.^[2][3]
• 1712–1728 – Bluteau lists vida deliciosa, lugar delicioso and manjar delicioso.^[9]
• 1720 – a private letter spells it dilicioso.^[11]
• 1789 – Morais defines it as “causing delight” and “given to pleasures”.^[12]
• 1871–1874 – Vieira marks the sense “voluptuous” as old.^[6]

Meanings

Adjective

1. delicious; very pleasant to the taste: um bolo delicioso.^[2][10][1]
2. Delightful; giving great pleasure; charming: uma tarde deliciosa na praia.^[2][13]
3. Enchanting in its beauty or artistic quality (of a landscape, music, a book).^[2]
4. Witty, amusing: uma anedota deliciosa.^[2][13]
5. (dated) Given to pleasures; voluptuous.^[6][14]

Word family

• deliciosamente

Related words

• delícia
• deliciar
• deleitoso
• Spanish delicioso

Usage notes

The stressed vowel is closed /o/ in the masculine singular and open in the plural deliciosos and in the feminine.^[15][10]

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 Houaiss, Antônio; Villar, Mauro de Salles (2001), Dicionário Houaiss da língua portuguesa, Rio de Janeiro: Objetiva, p. s.v. delicioso
3. ^ a b c Cunha, Antônio Geraldo da (2010), Dicionário etimológico da língua portuguesa, 4th ed., Rio de Janeiro: Lexikon, p. s.v. delicioso
4. ^ Nascentes, Antenor (1966), Dicionário etimológico resumido, Rio de Janeiro: Instituto Nacional do Livro, p. s.v. delicioso
5. ^ Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press, p. s.v. dēlĭcĭōsus
6. ^ a b c d 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, 754
7. ^ 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. delicioso
8. ^ Silva, António de Morais (1813), Diccionario da lingua portugueza, 2nd ed., 2 vols., Lisboa: Typographia Lacerdina, p. 1, 525
9. ^ 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. delicioso
10. ^ a b c d 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. delicioso
11. ^ 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. delicioso
12. ^ 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, 372
13. ^ a b Ferreira, Aurélio Buarque de Holanda, Novo dicionário Aurélio da língua portuguesa, digital edition, p. s.v. delicioso
14. ^ 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. delicioso
15. ^ Dicionário Priberam da Língua Portuguesa, Lisboa: Priberam Informática, https://dicionario.priberam.org, p. s.v. delicioso