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império

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Etymology and origin of the Portuguese word império

Confidence
Established
Formation
Borrowing
First attested
1200s spelt emperio More words from the 13th century
Borrowed from
Latin imperium
Ultimate origin
Latin parō
Etymology tree
inherited borrowed derived
Latin parō
Italian parare
French parade
English parade
Portuguese parar
Spanish parar
English pare
Latin imperō
Latin imperium
French empire
Portuguese império
Romanian imperiu
Spanish imperio
From the same root
Latin apparō ← parō
Latin disparō ← parō
Latin parābilis ← parō
Latin parātus ← parō
Latin praeparō ← parō
Latin reparō ← parō
Latin sēparō ← parō
Spanish parada ← parō
Portuguese aparar ← parar
Latin imperābiliter ← imperō
Latin imperātor ← imperō
Latin imperātrīx ← imperō
Latin imperitō ← imperō
Latin imperiālis ← imperium
Latin imperiōsus ← imperium

Pronunciation

  • Brazil: /ĩˈpɛ.ɾju/[1]
  • Portugal: /ĩˈpɛ.ɾju/[1]

Forms

império m (plural impérios)[1] Old Galician-Portuguese wrote emperio and empeiro in the 13th century;[2][3] imperio, closer to the Latin, is recorded from the 14th.[2][3]

Etymology

It is borrowed from Latin imperium (“command, authority; empire”), taken over by the learned route.[2][4][1] The oldest texts write Old Galician-Portuguese emperio and Old Galician-Portuguese empeiro; the form Old Galician-Portuguese imperio of the 14th century was reshaped after the Latin spelling.[2][1]

The same Latin word gave Galician imperio, Spanish imperio, Catalan imperi, Italian impero and French empire.[1] The French word too was taken from Latin, first as empirie and emperie in the 11th and 12th centuries.[5]

The Latin noun is formed from imperō (“to command”) with the suffix -ium.[6][1] The verb is made of in- and parō (“to prepare, arrange”).[1]

Earliest recorded meaning

Among the first records are the Cantigas de Santa Maria, which speak of a land where eno emperio pouca gent' é “few people are in the empire”, and the Crónica Geral, which counts the years of o inperio Locario and of the enperio de Carlos, the reigns of Lothair and Charlemagne.[3] The sense there is already the rule of an emperor and the realm he governs.[3]

Semantic evolution

Bluteau in 1712 defined the word as a monarchy or very large region ruled by one prince, noted that in his day it meant above all Germany and the emperor's lands, and gave it the older senses “command, authority, dominion”.[7] He also recorded that at Alenquer a festival founded by Queen Isabel and King Dinis was called Imperio.[7] This is the root of the sense that survives in the Azores and Madeira: the small chapel where the crown of the Holy Spirit is shown at Pentecost, the fair held beside it, and the whole festival, which Houaiss dates to 1913.[2][8][9]

Legal language had império mero, the sovereign's absolute power over his subjects, including the right to take life and goods, and mero ou misto império, the jurisdiction he granted to judges.[10] Figueiredo's dictionary of 1899 already lists “arrogance” and “predominance” beside the political senses.[11] In Brazil the word names the monarchy of Pedro I and Pedro II, from independence to the republic.[12] Modern dictionaries add a vast economic group under one owner, and an adjective for the style of Napoleon's First Empire.[2][13]

Timeline

  • 13th century – emperio and empeiro in Galician-Portuguese texts, among them the Cantigas de Santa Maria.[2][3]
  • 14th century – the latinised spelling imperio.[2]
  • c. 1400 – emperio in a fragment of the Flos Sanctorum (witness 1380–1425).[14]
  • 1513 – imperio in the Livro dos Mártires.[15]
  • 1712 – Bluteau records the Alenquer festival called Imperio.[7]
  • 1813 – Morais defines império mero and misto império.[10]
  • 1899 – Figueiredo lists the senses “arrogance” and “predominance”.[11]
  • 1913 – first date of the Azorean and Madeiran sense “chapel or fair of the Holy Spirit”.[2]

Meanings

Noun

  1. The power or authority of an emperor (imperador) or empress.[2][16]
  2. A monarchy whose sovereign bears the title of emperor; the empire so governed and its people: o Império do Brasil.[2][8]
  3. The period of an emperor's reign.[2][8][1]
  4. Sovereign dominion, command or dominating influence: exercia império sobre toda a região.[2][17]
  5. A political unit that rules a vast territory or many peoples under one power; by analogy, any very large state, whatever its government.[2][8][1]
  6. A large business or economic group controlled by one person or company.[2][13][1]
  7. (figurative) Irresistible influence, predominance: o império da razão.[2][13]
  8. (figurative) An imperious tone or attitude; arrogance.[2][13][1]
  9. (Azores, Madeira, Brazil) A small chapel where the crown of the Holy Spirit is displayed at Pentecost; the fair held there;[2][8][13] (Azores) the whole festival of the Holy Spirit.[2][8][13]
  10. (as an adjective, invariable) In the style of Napoleon's First Empire: cadeiras império.[2]

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 Houaiss, Antônio; Villar, Mauro de Salles (2001), Dicionário Houaiss da língua portuguesa, Rio de Janeiro: Objetiva, p. s.v. império
  3. ^ a b c d e 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. emperio
  4. ^ Nascentes, Antenor (1966), Dicionário etimológico resumido, Rio de Janeiro: Instituto Nacional do Livro, p. s.v. império
  5. ^ Rey, Alain, ed. (1992), Dictionnaire historique de la langue française, Paris: Le Robert, p. s.v. empire
  6. ^ Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
  7. ^ a b c Bluteau, Raphael (1712–1728), Vocabulario portuguez e latino, 8 vols. + 2 supplement vols., Coimbra / Lisboa (CLP transcription, Universidade de Aveiro), p. s.v. império
  8. ^ a b c d e f Porto Editora (2013), Grande Dicionário da Língua Portuguesa, Porto: Porto Editora, p. 5111
  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. império
  10. ^ a b Silva, António de Morais (1813), Diccionario da lingua portugueza, 2nd ed., 2 vols., Lisboa: Typographia Lacerdina, p. 2, 135
  11. ^ a b Figueiredo, Cândido de (1899), Novo diccionário da língua portuguesa, 1st ed., 2 vols., Lisboa: Tavares Cardoso & Irmão, p. 732
  12. ^ Schlee, Aldyr Garcia (2019), Dicionário da Cultura Pampeana Sul-Rio-Grandense, 2 vols., Pelotas: Fructos do Paiz, p. s.v. império
  13. ^ a b c d e f Dicionário Priberam da Língua Portuguesa, Lisboa: Priberam Informática, https://dicionario.priberam.org, p. s.v. império
  14. ^ Centro de Linguística da Universidade de Lisboa, CTA – Corpus de Textos Antigos, https://teitok.clul.ul.pt/cta, p. s.v. emperio
  15. ^ Centro de Linguística da Universidade de Lisboa, CTA – Corpus de Textos Antigos, https://teitok.clul.ul.pt/cta, p. s.v. imperio
  16. ^ 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. império
  17. ^ Ferreira, Aurélio Buarque de Holanda, Novo dicionário Aurélio da língua portuguesa, digital edition, p. s.v. império

Related etymologies

Cite this entry

“Império.” Etymologically, 15 Nov. 2026, etymologically.com/pt/imp%C3%A9rio. Accessed 16 Nov. 2026.

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