feito

Forms

feito (feminine feita, masculine plural feitos, feminine plural feitas)^[1]

Etymology

It is inherited from Latin factus (“done, made”), written Old Galician-Portuguese feito in the oldest texts.^[2][1] The Latin word is the past participle of faciō (“to make, do”), whose passive fīō (“to be made, become”) Houaiss names as the verb it belongs to; the same Latin verb gave fazer, whose past participle it is.^[2][3]

The noun is inherited from Latin factum (“deed, act”), the neuter of the participle used as a noun.^[2][4][1] Nascentes instead derives the noun from the plural of the Latin noun.^[5] The learned borrowing of the same Latin noun is facto, in Brazil fato, a doublet of the inherited word.^[2][1]

The same Latin word is Galician feito, Spanish hecho (old fecho), Catalan fet, French fait, Italian fatto and Romanian fapt.^[6][7] The Latin verb goes back to Proto-Indo-European *dʰeh₁- (“to put”), extended as *dʰh₁-k- (“to make”).^[8]

Earliest recorded meaning

Houaiss dates the noun to the 13th century, and Cunha has the spelling fey- from the same century.^[2][9] In the cantigas of the Cancioneiro da Ajuda feito is the participle of fazer, and the noun means a deed or exploit.^[10] The phrase a feito is "indeed" and deste feito "in this matter".^[10] Pero da Ponte uses bom feito for good conduct, and King Dinis writes E pois meu feito, senhor, assi é "and since my case, lady, is so".^[11]

Semantic evolution

The cantigas d'amigo have ben feito "well-shaped".^[10] Pereira (1697) glosses feitos with Latin res gestae "deeds", and Folqman (1755) has homem feito "a grown man".^[12][13] Morais (1789) records feito d'armas "feat of arms", the saying meu dito meu feito "no sooner said than done" and o feito for a lawsuit and its records, the sense of the legal plural feitos.^[14] Figueiredo (1899) adds the player who declares a hand against the others in the card game voltarete.^[15]

From "made, finished" the adjective came to mean "used to", "trained", "grown up, mature" and "agreed".^[2][4] In Brazil it is also a conjunction "like, as" (dormia feito pedra), and in candomblé and umbanda it means "initiated".^[2][16] Bem feito! expresses satisfaction at a deserved mishap.^[2][17]

Timeline

• 13th century – first records of the participle and the noun.^[2][9][10]
• c. 1430 – the Horto do Esposo, the first CTA text with the word.^[18]
• 1697 – Pereira glosses feitos as Latin res gestae.^[12]
• 1755 – Folqman lists homem feito.^[13]
• 1789 – Morais records feito d'armas and the legal sense.^[14]
• 1899 – Figueiredo records the card-game sense.^[15]

Meanings

Adjective

1. done, made, produced; finished, ready: O jantar já está feito.^[2][19][1]
2. Accustomed, used to something; trained, practised.^[2][4]
3. Grown up, mature: um homem feito.^[2][4]
4. Agreed, settled: negócio feito.^[2][16]
5. (Brazil, informal) Determined, resolute.^[2]
6. (religion) Initiated in candomblé or umbanda.^[2]

Noun

1. A deed, act; a notable achievement, a feat: os feitos de um herói.^[2][4][1]
2. (law) A lawsuit and its records, mostly in the plural.^[2][19]
3. (card games) In voltarete and similar games, the player who plays alone against the others.^[2][19]

Conjunction

1. (Brazil, informal) Like, as: Corria feito um louco.^[2][16][1]

Interjection

1. Done!, deal!, sealing an agreement; in casinos, the call that closes the bets.^[2][1]

Related words

• fazer
• facto
• fato
• feitor
• feitura
• Latin factum
• Galician feito
• Spanish hecho

Usage notes

De feito means "in fact, indeed".^[2][19]

Houaiss records a separate, obsolete noun feito "fern", spelt feeito in the 15th century, from Late Latin filictum "place where ferns grow".^[2] The DLP lists it as a regional botanical word, another name for feto.^[19] Galician has the same word as fieito.^[20]

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 r s t u v Houaiss, Antônio; Villar, Mauro de Salles (2001), Dicionário Houaiss da língua portuguesa, Rio de Janeiro: Objetiva, p. s.v. feito
3. ^ Bluteau, Raphael (1712–1728), Vocabulario portuguez e latino, 8 vols. + 2 supplement vols., Coimbra / Lisboa (CLP transcription, Universidade de Aveiro), p. s.v. feito
4. ^ a b c d e Ferreira, Aurélio Buarque de Holanda, Novo dicionário Aurélio da língua portuguesa, digital edition, p. s.v. feito
5. ^ Nascentes, Antenor (1966), Dicionário etimológico resumido, Rio de Janeiro: Instituto Nacional do Livro, p. s.v. feito
6. ^ Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter, p. 3135
7. ^ García de Diego, Vicente (1985), Diccionario etimológico español e hispánico, 2nd ed., Madrid: Espasa-Calpe (1st ed. 1954), p. s.v. factus
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. faciō
9. ^ a b Cunha, Antônio Geraldo da (2010), Dicionário etimológico da língua portuguesa, 4th ed., Rio de Janeiro: Lexikon, p. s.v. feito
10. ^ a b c d 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. feito
11. ^ Lopes, Graça Videira; Ferreira, Manuel Pedro et al. (2011–), Cantigas Medievais Galego-Portuguesas [online database], Lisboa: Instituto de Estudos Medievais, FCSH/NOVA, https://cantigas.fcsh.unl.pt, p. s.v. feito
12. ^ a b Pereira, Bento (1697), Thesouro da lingoa portuguesa, in the 1697 edition of his Prosodia (1st ed. 1647; CLP transcription, Universidade de Aveiro), p. s.v. feito
13. ^ a b Folqman, Carlos (1755), Diccionario portuguez, e latino, Lisboa: Régia Officina Silviana (CLP transcription, Universidade de Aveiro), p. s.v. feito
14. ^ 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, 606
15. ^ a b Figueiredo, Cândido de (1899), Novo diccionário da língua portuguesa, 1st ed., 2 vols., Lisboa: Tavares Cardoso & Irmão, p. 606
16. ^ 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. feito
17. ^ Schlee, Aldyr Garcia (2019), Dicionário da Cultura Pampeana Sul-Rio-Grandense, 2 vols., Pelotas: Fructos do Paiz, p. s.v. feito
18. ^ Centro de Linguística da Universidade de Lisboa, CTA – Corpus de Textos Antigos, https://teitok.clul.ul.pt/cta, p. s.v. feito
19. ^ a b c d e 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. feito
20. ^ Estraviz, Isaac Alonso, Dicionário Estraviz, https://estraviz.org, p. s.v. fieito