leite

Forms

leite m (plural leites)^[1] Houaiss records leyte in the 14th century and lecte in the 15th.^[2]

Etymology

It is inherited from Latin lac (“milk”), written Old Galician-Portuguese leite in the oldest texts.^[1][2] The Latin noun was neuter, with an older nominative lacte; popular Latin made it masculine, and the masculine accusative is found already in Petronius.^[3][1] Nascentes and the REW start from the form with final -e rather than the classical one.^[4][5]

The same Latin word is Galician leite, Mirandese lheite, Spanish leche, Catalan llet, Occitan lach, French lait, Italian latte and Romanian lapte.^[5][1] Galician and Portuguese keep the masculine gender, which reaches into León and Asturias, while Castilian, Catalan and Gascon made the word feminine.^[6]

The origin of the Latin word is disputed.^[1] De Vaan reconstructs Proto-Italic *(g)lagt- and Proto-Indo-European *glg-t- (“milk”), shared with Ancient Greek γάλα (gála) and Armenian.^[7] Wiktionary notes that neither the set of cognates nor whether the word was inherited or borrowed is agreed.^[1]

Earliest recorded meaning

Houaiss dates the word to the 13th century from Cunha's slips of medieval Portuguese.^[2] The Cantigas de Santa Maria use it for a mother's milk (deitou leite das tetas “milk flowed from her breasts”) and for the holy milk of the Virgin, and once make it feminine: bẽeyta a ta leite “blessed be your milk”.^[8] A cantiga d'escarnho also has it, in molheres de leite “wet nurses”.^[9]

Semantic evolution

Already Morais (1789) records the transferred sense “milky sap of trees and plants” (o leite da figueira), the phrases irmão de leite “foster brother”, dentes de leite “milk teeth” and beber alguma doutrina com o leite “to learn a doctrine from earliest childhood”, and mar leite “a very calm sea”.^[10] Bluteau (1712–1728) still explained milk as blood cooked twice by nature.^[11]

Later senses name any milky liquid or preparation (leite de coco, leite de magnésia), and colloquially semen.^[2][1] In Portugal the word is popular for “luck”, and in Rio Grande do Sul ter leite means “to be lucky”.^[12][13] Brazilian dialect surveys record it for the cassava's milky sap and for the soft substance of a crab that is changing its shell.^[14]

The word passed into Kabuverdianu as leti and into Macanese as lete.^[1]

Timeline

• 13th century – leite in the Cantigas de Santa Maria.^[8][2]
• 14th century – the spelling leyte.^[2]
• 1416 – leite in the Vida do Cativo Monge Confesso, its first occurrence in the CTA corpus.^[15]
• 1569 – Cardoso glosses leite with Latin lac.^[16]
• 1789 – Morais records irmão de leite, dentes de leite and the milky sap of plants.^[10]

Meanings

Noun

1. milk: the white liquid secreted by the mammary glands of women and female mammals; cow's milk as food: Bebe sempre um copo de leite ao deitar.^[2][17][1]
2. The white sap of certain fruits and plants, such as the fig or the rubber tree; latex.^[2][1]
3. An emulsion or preparation that looks like milk: leite de amêndoas, leite de magnésia; any milky liquid.^[2][18]
4. (colloquial) semen.^[1][19]
5. (Portugal, popular) Luck.^[12][14]

Word family

• leitão
• leiteiro
• leitoso
• leitelho
• leitinho

Related words

• lactar
• lácteo
• lacticínio
• láctico
• lactose
• leituga
• Latin lac
• Galician leite
• Spanish leche

Usage notes

Idioms include tirar leite de pedra “to draw milk from a stone”, to achieve the impossible;^[2][17][13] esconder o leite “to hide the milk”, to keep one's means or intentions secret; and the Brazilian a leite de pato “for duck's milk”, for nothing, without pay or stakes.^[2][17][13]

References

1. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k Houaiss, Antônio; Villar, Mauro de Salles (2001), Dicionário Houaiss da língua portuguesa, Rio de Janeiro: Objetiva, p. s.v. leite
3. ^ Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press, p. s.v. lac
4. ^ Nascentes, Antenor (1955), Dicionário etimológico da língua portuguesa, vol. 1: Nomes comuns, Rio de Janeiro (1st ed. 1932, preface by W. Meyer-Lübke), p. 294
5. ^ a b Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter, p. 4817
6. ^ Corominas, Joan; Pascual, José A. (1980–1991), Diccionario crítico etimológico castellano e hispánico, 6 vols., Madrid: Gredos, p. 3, 615
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 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. leite
9. ^ 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. leite
10. ^ a b Silva, António de Morais (1789), Diccionario da lingua portugueza composto pelo padre D. Rafael Bluteau, reformado, e accrescentado, 2 vols., Lisboa: Simão Thaddeo Ferreira, p. 2, 14
11. ^ Bluteau, Raphael (1712–1728), Vocabulario portuguez e latino, 8 vols. + 2 supplement vols., Coimbra / Lisboa (CLP transcription, Universidade de Aveiro), p. s.v. leite
12. ^ a b Porto Editora (2013), Grande Dicionário da Língua Portuguesa, Porto: Porto Editora, p. 5628
13. ^ a b c Schlee, Aldyr Garcia (2019), Dicionário da Cultura Pampeana Sul-Rio-Grandense, 2 vols., Pelotas: Fructos do Paiz, p. s.v. leite
14. ^ a b 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. leite
15. ^ Centro de Linguística da Universidade de Lisboa, CTA – Corpus de Textos Antigos, https://teitok.clul.ul.pt/cta, p. s.v. leite
16. ^ Cardoso, Jerónimo (1569–1570), Dictionarium ex lusitanico in latinum sermonem, Lisboa: João Álvares (CLP transcription, Universidade de Aveiro), p. s.v. leite
17. ^ a b c Ferreira, Aurélio Buarque de Holanda, Novo dicionário Aurélio da língua portuguesa, digital edition, p. s.v. leite
18. ^ 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. leite
19. ^ Estraviz, Isaac Alonso, Dicionário Estraviz, https://estraviz.org, p. s.v. leite