hoje

Forms

hoje (not comparable)^[1] Old Galician-Portuguese wrote oje, oge, oie and oye; the spelling with h- appears in the 14th century.^[2][3] The glossary of the Cancioneiro da Ajuda notes that it writes og before e and i and oj before a, o and u.^[3]

Etymology

It is inherited from Latin hodiē (“today”), written Old Galician-Portuguese oje and Old Galician-Portuguese oge in the oldest texts.^[2][3][4][1]

The same Latin word is Galician hoxe, Spanish hoy, Catalan avui, French hui (now only in aujourd'hui) and Italian oggi.^[5][1]

The Latin adverb is a compound of hic (“this”) and diēs (“day”), “on this day”.^[6][1] De Vaan notes that the second part is probably an old ablative, though this is uncertain, that Faliscan foied (“today”) suggests an older form without the /d/, and that the case of the first part is disputed.^[6]

Earliest recorded meaning

The oldest record in the DDGM is a charter of 1228: quaes a uossa generación oye auedes “which your descendants hold today”.^[3] Houaiss dates oje to the 13th century, and the Cantigas de Santa Maria already use it both alone and in phrases such as d'oj' a un ano “a year from today”.^[2][3]

Semantic evolution

The medieval language had several emphatic phrases: oje este dia and oje dia “this very day; nowadays”, des oje mais “from today on” and d'oj' a tres dias “three days from today”.^[3][7] The glossary of the cantigas d'amigo compares oje dia with Spanish hoy día and Old French hui cel jour.^[7] Barbosa (1611) has hoje pella manhaã “this morning” and the shopkeepers' notice Hoje não fião aqui, amanhaã si “no credit here today, tomorrow yes”.^[8] Bluteau (1712) gives both “on this day” and “nowadays, in our time”.^[9] As a noun, o hoje “the present day, the present age” is in Silva Bastos (1912).^[10]

Timeline

• 1228 – oye in a charter.^[3]
• 1270 – des oge este dia “from this day on” in a document.^[3]
• 13th century – oje and oge in the cantigas.^[2][3]
• 14th century – the spelling hoje.^[2]
• 1430 – oge in the Horto do Esposo (witness 1390–1437).^[11]
• 1431 – hoje in the Vida do honrado Infante Josafat (witness 1431–1446).^[12]
• 1611 – Barbosa lists hoje pella manhaã “this morning”.^[8]
• 1899 – Figueiredo explains the Latin word as a contraction of hoc die.^[13]

Meanings

Adverb

1. today, on the present day: Hoje é feriado.^[2][14][1]
2. nowadays, at the present time: Hoje já ninguém escreve cartas.^[2][14][1]

Noun

1. The present day; the present age: os jovens de hoje.^[2][15]

Related words

• hodierno
• Latin hodiē
• Spanish hoy

Usage notes

Hoje em dia means “nowadays”, de hoje a oito dias “a week from today”, and mais hoje, mais amanhã “sooner or later”.^[2][14]

References

1. ^ a b c d e f g h 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. hoje
3. ^ a b c d e f g h i 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. oge
4. ^ Nascentes, Antenor (1966), Dicionário etimológico resumido, Rio de Janeiro: Instituto Nacional do Livro, p. s.v. hoje
5. ^ Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter, p. 4163
6. ^ a b de Vaan, Michiel (2008), Etymological Dictionary of Latin and the other Italic Languages, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 7, Leiden; Boston: Brill
7. ^ 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. oje
8. ^ a b Barbosa, Agostinho (1611), Dictionarium lusitanicolatinum, Braga: Fructuoso Lourenço de Basto (CLP transcription, Universidade de Aveiro), p. s.v. hoje
9. ^ Bluteau, Raphael (1712–1728), Vocabulario portuguez e latino, 8 vols. + 2 supplement vols., Coimbra / Lisboa (CLP transcription, Universidade de Aveiro), p. s.v. hoje
10. ^ Silva Bastos, José Timóteo da (1912), Diccionario etymologico, prosodico e orthographico da lingua portugueza, Lisboa: Parceria António Maria Pereira, p. s.v. hoje
11. ^ Centro de Linguística da Universidade de Lisboa, CTA – Corpus de Textos Antigos, https://teitok.clul.ul.pt/cta, p. s.v. oge
12. ^ Centro de Linguística da Universidade de Lisboa, CTA – Corpus de Textos Antigos, https://teitok.clul.ul.pt/cta, p. s.v. hoje
13. ^ Figueiredo, Cândido de (1899), Novo diccionário da língua portuguesa, 1st ed., 2 vols., Lisboa: Tavares Cardoso & Irmão, p. s.v. hoje
14. ^ a b c Ferreira, Aurélio Buarque de Holanda, Novo dicionário Aurélio da língua portuguesa, digital edition, p. s.v. hoje
15. ^ 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. hoje