grande

Forms

grande m or f (plural grandes)^[1] Old Galician-Portuguese used the shortened gran before a noun beginning with a consonant (gran coita “great sorrow”, gran pavor “great fear”).^[2][3] Wiktionary lists grãde and ganda as alternative forms.^[1]

Etymology

It is inherited from Latin grandis (“full-grown, big, great”), written Old Galician-Portuguese grande and, before a consonant, Old Galician-Portuguese gran in the oldest texts.^[4][1][2] Nascentes notes that it took the place of magnus (“great”); the REW says the same of the Romance languages as a whole, and the DHLF notes that the Latin word was the commoner one in spoken Latin.^[5][6][7]

The same Latin word is Galician grande, Spanish grande, Catalan gran, French grand and Italian grande.^[6][1] The Spanish word is first recorded in a document of 1048.^[8]

The origin of the Latin adjective is unclear.^[1][7] Wiktionary gives the traditional link with Proto-Indo-European *gʰer- (“to rub, grind”) and Proto-Germanic *grautaz (“big, coarse”), the source of the English word great, and Pokorny's alternative *gʷʰrendʰ- (“to swell”), which would connect it with Ancient Greek βρένθος (brénthos, “pride”).^[1] The OLD gives the second explanation as a possibility.^[9]

Earliest recorded meaning

Houaiss dates the adjective to the 13th century, from the slips of Cunha's index of medieval Portuguese.^[4] The cantigas use both forms: the Cantigas de Santa Maria call the Virgin Madre do gran Rei “Mother of the great King”, and in the cantigas d'amigo grande means “tall”, “costly” and “difficult”.^[2][10]

Semantic evolution

The Crónica Troiana already uses the adjective as a noun for “stature” (de bon grande “of good stature”) and of rank, os grandes señores “the great lords”.^[10] The noun for the great of the realm became a title: Morais (1813) explains os Grandes do Reino as the dukes, the counts and some viscounts with that privilege, and records à la grande “in grand style”.^[11]

Modern senses include “grown up” and “adult”, “eminent at one's work”, “magnanimous”, and, before a city's name, “greater”, as in a Grande Lisboa.^[4][1] In informal Brazilian Portuguese it is a friendly word of address before a name.^[4] In Portugal a grande is the first prize of the lottery.^[12] Saramaccan borrowed the word as gãã́.^[1]

Timeline

• 1200s – Houaiss's first date, from Cunha's index of medieval Portuguese.^[4]
• 1350 – grande in the Trasladação de S. Nicolau, a 14th-century witness.^[13]
• 1500 – the spelling gramde in a private letter.^[14]
• 1712–1728 – Bluteau translates the word with Latin magnus and grandis.^[15]
• 1813 – Morais explains os Grandes do Reino.^[11]
• 1871–1874 – Vieira defines the adjective as “having more than ordinary dimensions”.^[16]

Meanings

Adjective

1. big, large; of more than usual size or extent: um quintal grande.^[4][17][1]
2. Long, of great length or duration: umas férias grandes.^[4][17]
3. Numerous; made up of many people or things: um grande grupo de alunos.^[4][1]
4. Intense, strong: Fazia um grande calor.^[4][17]
5. Grown up, adult: Agora que é grande, já vai sozinho à escola.^[4][1]
6. Important, powerful; eminent at what one does: um grande pintor.^[4][1]
7. Noble, magnanimous.^[4][1]
8. (before a city's name) Greater, with its surrounding area: a Grande Lisboa.^[4][1]
9. (Brazil, informal) A friendly word of address placed before a name.^[4][1]

Noun

1. A person of high rank or power;^[18][12] (in the plural) the nobles, the powerful.^[18][12]
2. An adult, as seen by a child; a tall person.^[12][18]
3. (Portugal, informal, feminine) The first prize in the lottery.^[12]

Word family

• grandão
• grandemente
• grandinho
• grandeza
• engrandecer

Related words

• grandioso
• Latin grandis
• Galician grande

Usage notes

À grande means “lavishly, in grand style”.^[18]

References

1. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c 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. gran
3. ^ Universo Cantigas: Glosario da poesía medieval profana galego-portuguesa, A Coruña: Instituto da Lingua e Literatura (ILLA), Universidade da Coruña, https://www.universocantigas.gal, p. s.v. gran
4. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n Houaiss, Antônio; Villar, Mauro de Salles (2001), Dicionário Houaiss da língua portuguesa, Rio de Janeiro: Objetiva, p. s.v. grande
5. ^ Nascentes, Antenor (1966), Dicionário etimológico resumido, Rio de Janeiro: Instituto Nacional do Livro, p. s.v. grande
6. ^ a b Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter
7. ^ a b Rey, Alain, ed. (1992), Dictionnaire historique de la langue française, Paris: Le Robert, p. s.v. grand
8. ^ Corominas, Joan; Pascual, José A. (1980–1991), Diccionario crítico etimológico castellano e hispánico, 6 vols., Madrid: Gredos, p. 3, 194
9. ^ Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press, p. s.v. grandis
10. ^ a b 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. grande
11. ^ a b Silva, António de Morais (1813), Diccionario da lingua portugueza, 2nd ed., 2 vols., Lisboa: Typographia Lacerdina, p. 2, 97
12. ^ 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. grande
13. ^ Centro de Linguística da Universidade de Lisboa, CTA – Corpus de Textos Antigos, https://teitok.clul.ul.pt/cta, p. s.v. grande
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. grande
15. ^ Bluteau, Raphael (1712–1728), Vocabulario portuguez e latino, 8 vols. + 2 supplement vols., Coimbra / Lisboa (CLP transcription, Universidade de Aveiro), p. s.v. grande
16. ^ Vieira, Frei Domingos (1871–1874), Grande Diccionario Portuguez ou Thesouro da lingua portugueza, 5 vols., Porto: Ernesto Chardron e Bartholomeu H. de Moraes, p. 3, 899
17. ^ a b c Ferreira, Aurélio Buarque de Holanda, Novo dicionário Aurélio da língua portuguesa, digital edition, p. s.v. grande
18. ^ a b c d Porto Editora (2013), Grande Dicionário da Língua Portuguesa, Porto: Porto Editora, p. 4766