grana

Forms

grana f (uncountable)^[1]

Etymology

Houaiss calls its origin obscure and reports the view of Aurélio that it comes from Portuguese grão (“grain”).^[2][3] Nascentes also derives it from that word.^[4] Wiktionary instead takes it as borrowed from Italian grana (“money; grain”).^[1] Nocentini explains the Italian slang sense by the coin called grano minted in the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies.^[5] The Italian noun itself is Latin grāna, the plural of grānum (“grain”), taken as a feminine singular.^[5]

The Latin noun is cognate with corn.^[6] De Vaan reconstructs it as Proto-Indo-European *ǵr̥h₂nóm (“that which has ripened, grain”), from the root meaning “to grow old, ripen”.^[7][1]

Semantic evolution

Houaiss dates the word to the 20th century as an informal Brazilian term.^[2] Aurélio's first edition of 1975 already has it as Brazilian slang, with a quotation from Humberto Crispim Borges's Cacho de Tucum.^[8] It is also known in Portugal: the TLPGP records it there with the sense “money”.^[9]

Timeline

• 20th century – first record, as Brazilian slang.^[2]
• 1971 – grana in a dated text in DELPo.^[10]
• 1975 – Aurélio's first edition lists it as Brazilian slang.^[8]

Meanings

Noun

1. (Brazil, slang) money, cash: Fiquei sem grana no fim do mês.^{[2][3][11][1]}

Related words

• grão
• grã
• Italian grana

Usage notes

An older grana, a cloth dyed scarlet with cochineal, is the same word as grã; the DLP takes it from Spanish.^[12][13][14] Houaiss and Aurélio also have a masculine plural grana in botany, the stacks of membranes in chloroplasts that hold the chlorophyll, taken in the 20th century from the Latin plural.^[2][3]

References

1. ^ a b c d e f g Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e Houaiss, Antônio; Villar, Mauro de Salles (2001), Dicionário Houaiss da língua portuguesa, Rio de Janeiro: Objetiva, p. s.v. grana
3. ^ a b c Ferreira, Aurélio Buarque de Holanda, Novo dicionário Aurélio da língua portuguesa, digital edition, p. s.v. grana
4. ^ Nascentes, Antenor (1966), Dicionário etimológico resumido, Rio de Janeiro: Instituto Nacional do Livro, p. s.v. grana
5. ^ a b Nocentini, Alberto; Parenti, Alessandro (2010), l'Etimologico: vocabolario della lingua italiana, Firenze: Le Monnier
6. ^ Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press, p. s.v. grānum
7. ^ de Vaan, Michiel (2008), Etymological Dictionary of Latin and the other Italic Languages, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 7, Leiden; Boston: Brill
8. ^ a b Ferreira, Aurélio Buarque de Holanda (1975), Novo dicionário da língua portuguesa, 1st ed., Rio de Janeiro: Nova Fronteira, p. 721
9. ^ Instituto da Lingua Galega, Tesouro do léxico patrimonial galego e portugués (TLPGP), Santiago de Compostela: Universidade de Santiago de Compostela, https://ilg.usc.gal/tesouro, p. s.v. grana
10. ^ 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. grana
11. ^ 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. grana
12. ^ 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. grana
13. ^ 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. grana
14. ^ Dicionário Priberam da Língua Portuguesa, Lisboa: Priberam Informática, https://dicionario.priberam.org, p. s.v. grana