janela

Forms

janela f (plural janelas, diminutive janelinha, augmentative janelona)^[1] The old spelling was janella: the Vida de Tarsis has it in the 15th century, and Barbosa (1611) and Pereira (1697) head the word Ianella.^[2][3][4] Wiktionary also records the obsolete jenela.^[1]

Etymology

It is inherited from Vulgar Latin *iānuella (“little door”), a diminutive of Latin iānua (“door”) formed with -ella, written Old Galician-Portuguese janella in the old language.^[5][6][7][1] The REW lists it among the derivatives of the Latin noun, which itself survives in Sardinian janna.^[8][1] The word belongs to the west of the Peninsula: Galician xanela and Mirandese jinela beside it, and the Portuguese Wiktionary also compares Catalan ginella.^[1][9]

It replaced Latin fenestra (“window”), which gave French fenêtre, Italian finestra and Portuguese fresta.^[5][6] For the /n/ kept between vowels, Houaiss compares janeiro, which he derives from *iannārius, with the consonantal u assimilated to the n, rather than directly from iānuārius.^[5] Nascentes points to the discussions of Nunes and Gonçalves Viana.^[10]

Wiktionary derives the Latin noun from Proto-Indo-European *yeh₂- (“to go”), while Lewis and Short connect it with Iānus and eō (“to go”).^[1][11] The senses “time window” and “window on a computer screen” are semantic loans from window.^[1]

Earliest recorded meaning

Houaiss dates the word to the 13th century, from the slips of Cunha's index of medieval Portuguese, in the sense of an opening in an outer wall that lets in light and air.^[5] The oldest text in the CTA corpus to have it is the Vida de Tarsis, in a 15th-century witness, spelt janella.^[2]

Semantic evolution

Houaiss dates to 1528 the sense of the frame, usually glazed, that closes the opening.^[5] Barbosa's dictionary of 1611 renders Ianella by Latin fenestra and the diminutive janelinha by fenestella.^[3] Silva Bastos records the familiar sense of a hole or tear and the popular plural janelas “the eyes”.^[12]

Technical uses followed: a blank in a text where a word is missing, the oval and round windows of the ear, an opening in an envelope or a camera, a slot left for advertisements in radio and television, and the area of a computer screen in which a program shows a document.^[5][7] Brazilian slang uses it for the breast pocket of a jacket and, among students, for a free period between classes.^[5][13]

The word passed into the creoles, as janéla in Kabuverdianu and djanela in Guinea-Bissau Creole, and was borrowed into Konkani, Bengali, Hindi and Chichewa.^[1]

Timeline

• 13th century – first record, in the sense “window”.^[5]
• 15th century – janella in the Vida de Tarsis (witness 1431–1446).^[2]
• 1528 – first record of the sense “window frame”.^[5]
• 1577 – janelas in a private letter.^[14]
• 1611 – Barbosa heads the word Ianella and gives the diminutive janelinha.^[3]
• 1912 – Silva Bastos records the plural janelas “the eyes”.^[12]

Meanings

Noun

1. A window, an opening in an outer wall or in a vehicle that lets in light and air.^{[5][7][15][1]}
2. The frame, usually glazed, that closes such an opening; a sash, caixilho.^[5][15]
3. (informal) Any hole, gap or tear, as in clothing;^[5][13][1] (childish) the gap left by a lost milk tooth.^[5][13][1]
4. A blank left in a text where a word is missing.^[5][7]
5. (anatomy) Either of two openings in the inner wall of the tympanic cavity, the oval and the round window.^[5]
6. (computing) A rectangular area of the screen in which a program shows a document, file or image.^[5][1]
7. A period of time suited to something;^[5][7][1] (radio, television) a slot left in programmes for advertisements.^[5][7][1]
8. (Brazil, slang) The upper outer pocket of a jacket; among students, a free period.^[5][13]
9. (in the plural, popular) The eyes.^[5][13][12]

Word family

• janelão
• janeleiro
• janelinha
• janelar
• sobrejanela

Related words

• janeiro
• Jano
• fresta
• Latin iānua
• Galician xanela

Usage notes

Dialect surveys of Portugal record jenela and jinela; one author explains the e as a dissimilation of the a, and another notes that the change to i has not yet been explained.^[16][17]

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 Centro de Linguística da Universidade de Lisboa, CTA – Corpus de Textos Antigos, https://teitok.clul.ul.pt/cta, p. s.v. janella
3. ^ a b c Barbosa, Agostinho (1611), Dictionarium lusitanicolatinum, Braga: Fructuoso Lourenço de Basto (CLP transcription, Universidade de Aveiro), p. s.v. ianella
4. ^ 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. ianella
5. ^ 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. janela
6. ^ a b Nascentes, Antenor (1966), Dicionário etimológico resumido, Rio de Janeiro: Instituto Nacional do Livro, p. s.v. janela
7. ^ a b c d e f Ferreira, Aurélio Buarque de Holanda, Novo dicionário Aurélio da língua portuguesa, digital edition, p. s.v. janela
8. ^ Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter
9. ^ Wikcionário (Portuguese Wiktionary), pt.wiktionary.org, p. s.v. janela
10. ^ Nascentes, Antenor (1955), Dicionário etimológico da língua portuguesa, vol. 1: Nomes comuns, Rio de Janeiro (1st ed. 1932, preface by W. Meyer-Lübke), p. 283
11. ^ Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press, p. s.v. jānua
12. ^ a b c Silva Bastos, José Timóteo da (1912), Diccionario etymologico, prosodico e orthographico da lingua portugueza, Lisboa: Parceria António Maria Pereira, p. s.v. janela
13. ^ a b c d e 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. janela
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. janela
15. ^ a b Porto Editora (2013), Grande Dicionário da Língua Portuguesa, Porto: Porto Editora, p. 5455
16. ^ 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. jenela
17. ^ 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. jinela