entranha

Forms

entranha f (plural entranhas)^[1] Houaiss records entranha and entrana in the 14th century,^[2] and Wiktionary gives the Old Galician-Portuguese form as entranna.^[1] The word is mostly used in the plural, entranhas.^[2]

Etymology

It is inherited from Latin interānea (“the intestines”), written Old Galician-Portuguese entranna in the oldest texts.^[2][3][1] The Latin word is the neuter plural of interāneum (“intestine”), itself the noun use of the adjective interāneus (“inward, internal”); the plural was taken as a feminine singular.^[2][4][1] The Latin plural, in Columella and Pliny, already meant “the intestines, guts”.^[5] Nascentes cites the Late Latin sense “fourth stomach of ruminants”.^[6]

The same Latin word is Spanish entraña, Catalan entranya and Old French entraigne.^[7][8][1] The Spanish is recorded as entraina in the Glosas de Silos of the second half of the 10th century.^[9] French entrailles has another source, Late Latin intrālia, formed from the same word by a change of suffix.^[8]

Earliest recorded meaning

Houaiss dates the word to the 14th century from the medieval index.^[2] The Horto do Esposo, in a witness copied between 1390 and 1437, has the plural entranhas.^[10]

Semantic evolution

The bodily sense, the organs of the belly and chest, comes with the figurative ones that Cunha's definition puts first: the mother's womb, a person's nature and feelings.^[3][2] Bluteau (1712–1728) defines entranhas as the inner parts within the belly of an animal,^[11] and Morais (1789) adds the deepest parts of something (as entranhas da terra) and ter más entranhas “to have a bad heart, to like doing harm”.^[12] In southern Brazil and the Plate entranha is also a cut of beef taken from the diaphragm.^[13]

Timeline

• 14th century – first record, with the spellings entranha and entrana.^[2]
• 1390–1437 – entranhas in the Horto do Esposo.^[10]
• 1554 – Emtranhas in a private letter.^[14]
• 1569 – Cardoso's dictionary renders entranhas by Latin praecordia.^[15]
• 1789 – Morais records as entranhas da terra and ter más entranhas.^[12]

Meanings

Noun

1. (anatomy) Each of the viscera of the abdomen or chest, especially of the abdomen; in the plural, all of them, the bowels.^[2][16][4]
2. (usually in the plural) The mother's womb.^[2][4][17]
3. (figurative, usually in the plural) The heart as the seat of the feelings; a person's nature or character.^[17][18][1]
4. (figurative, usually in the plural) The innermost, deepest part of something: as entranhas da floresta.^[4][18]
5. (southern Brazil) A thin, tender cut of beef from the diaphragm.^[13]

Word family

• entranhar
• entranhado
• entranhadamente
• desentranhar

Related words

• Latin interāneus
• Spanish entraña

Usage notes

Pessoa sem entranhas is a cruel, heartless person.^[18]

References

1. ^ a b c d e f g h i 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. entranha
3. ^ a b Cunha, Antônio Geraldo da (2010), Dicionário etimológico da língua portuguesa, 4th ed., Rio de Janeiro: Lexikon, p. s.v. entranha
4. ^ 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. entranha
5. ^ Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press, p. s.v. interānea
6. ^ Nascentes, Antenor (1966), Dicionário etimológico resumido, Rio de Janeiro: Instituto Nacional do Livro, p. s.v. entranha
7. ^ Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter, p. 4487
8. ^ a b Rey, Alain, ed. (1992), Dictionnaire historique de la langue française, Paris: Le Robert, p. s.v. entrailles
9. ^ Corominas, Joan; Pascual, José A. (1980–1991), Diccionario crítico etimológico castellano e hispánico, 6 vols., Madrid: Gredos, p. 2, 644
10. ^ a b Centro de Linguística da Universidade de Lisboa, CTA – Corpus de Textos Antigos, https://teitok.clul.ul.pt/cta, p. s.v. entranhas
11. ^ Bluteau, Raphael (1712–1728), Vocabulario portuguez e latino, 8 vols. + 2 supplement vols., Coimbra / Lisboa (CLP transcription, Universidade de Aveiro), p. s.v. entranhas
12. ^ 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, 512
13. ^ a b Schlee, Aldyr Garcia (2019), Dicionário da Cultura Pampeana Sul-Rio-Grandense, 2 vols., Pelotas: Fructos do Paiz, p. s.v. entranha
14. ^ 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. entranha
15. ^ Cardoso, Jerónimo (1569–1570), Dictionarium ex lusitanico in latinum sermonem, Lisboa: João Álvares (CLP transcription, Universidade de Aveiro), p. s.v. entranhas
16. ^ Ferreira, Aurélio Buarque de Holanda, Novo dicionário Aurélio da língua portuguesa, digital edition, p. s.v. entranha
17. ^ a b Porto Editora (2013), Grande Dicionário da Língua Portuguesa, Porto: Porto Editora, p. 3637
18. ^ 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. entranha