maldizer

Forms

maldizer (first-person singular present maldigo, first-person singular preterite maldisse, past participle maldito)^[1] Old Galician-Portuguese texts have the preterite maldezi and maldisse, the future maldirei and the subjunctive maldiga.^[2][3] Houaiss records maldezer beside maldizer in the 14th century and mal diseer in the 15th.^[4]

Etymology

It is inherited from Latin maledīcō (“to speak ill of, revile”), recorded in the Old Galician-Portuguese texts of the 13th century.^[4][5][6][1] The Latin verb is formed from male (“badly”) and dīcō (“to say”), and its two parts are often written apart in Latin texts.^[7][8] Vieira explained the Portuguese verb instead as mal joined to dizer.^[9]

The same Latin word is Spanish maldecir, Catalan maldir, French maudire and Italian maledire.^[10][11] In Galician today it is maldecir, and the DDGM considers the other forms found in the dictionaries spurious.^[3] In classical Latin the verb meant “to abuse, insult”; the sense “to curse” is Christian Latin, and it is the sense the Romance verbs carry.^[7][12][13]

Earliest recorded meaning

In the Cantigas de Santa Maria a man goes his way maldizendo quen nunca por moller creeria “cursing whoever would ever trust a woman” (no. 285).^[3] A satirical cantiga of Airas Perez Vuitoron begins Maldisse Don Airas Soga ũa velha noutro dia “Don Airas Soga cursed an old woman the other day”.^[3][2] Both use the verb in the sense “to curse”.^[3]

Semantic evolution

The medieval verb meant “to curse”: the Crónica Geral and the Crónica Troiana have people who curse the day and hour they were born.^[3] The nominalised infinitive named a genre of satire: the medieval Arte de Trovar defines the cantigas de maldizer as those in which the troubadours attack someone openly, and the phrase cantigas de escárnio e de maldizer is still the name of that poetry.^[3][4][14] Houaiss also dates the sense “to speak ill of, slander” to the 14th century.^[4] Cardoso and Pereira gave it the Latin equivalents execror and maledico, and Bluteau treated it as a synonym of amaldiçoar, quoting Camões's lines in which the warriors curse war and “the inert old man”.^[15][16][17] Vieira added the intransitive use “to complain, lament one's lot”, which the modern dictionaries keep beside “to curse” and “to defame”.^[9][4][18]

Timeline

• 13th century – the Cantigas de Santa Maria use maldizendo “cursing”.^[3][5]
• 14th century – Houaiss's first date for the verb and for its sense “to speak ill of”; the spellings maldizer and maldezer.^[4]
• 1344 – the chronicle of that year has maldizia ssi et o dia em que nacera “he cursed himself and the day he was born”.^[3]
• c. 1430 – the Horto do Esposo (copied 1390–1437) has the verb, its first record in the prose texts of the CTA.^[19]
• 1569 – Cardoso renders maldizer with Latin execror.^[15]
• 1697 – Pereira's Thesouro gives maledico and detestor.^[16]
• 1712–1728 – Bluteau refers the verb to amaldiçoar and quotes Camões.^[17]
• 1871–1874 – Vieira lists “to defame”, “to curse” and the intransitive “to complain”.^[9]

Meanings

Verb

1. To curse; to call down evil on someone or something: Maldisse o dia em que partiu.^{[4][18][20][1]}
2. To speak ill of; to slander or defame: Passava as tardes a maldizer os vizinhos.^[4][21][20]
3. (intransitive) To blaspheme; to utter curses.^[21][14]
4. (with de) To complain of, lament: maldizer da sua vida.^[4][22][20]

Noun

1. Evil-speaking, maledicência, especially in cantigas de escárnio e de maldizer, the satirical poetry of the troubadours.^[4][21][14]

Related words

• dizer
• bendizer
• maldito
• maldição
• maldizente
• maledicência
• amaldiçoar
• Latin maledīcō
• Spanish maldecir

References

1. ^ a b c d e f g Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b 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. maldizer
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. maldizer
4. ^ a b c d e f g h i j Houaiss, Antônio; Villar, Mauro de Salles (2001), Dicionário Houaiss da língua portuguesa, Rio de Janeiro: Objetiva, p. s.v. maldizer
5. ^ a b Cunha, Antônio Geraldo da (2010), Dicionário etimológico da língua portuguesa, 4th ed., Rio de Janeiro: Lexikon, p. s.v. maldizer
6. ^ Nascentes, Antenor (1966), Dicionário etimológico resumido, Rio de Janeiro: Instituto Nacional do Livro, p. s.v. maldizer
7. ^ a b Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press, p. s.v. maledīcō
8. ^ Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
9. ^ a b c Vieira, Frei Domingos (1871–1874), Grande Diccionario Portuguez ou Thesouro da lingua portugueza, 5 vols., Porto: Ernesto Chardron e Bartholomeu H. de Moraes, p. 4, 61
10. ^ Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter, p. 5258
11. ^ García de Diego, Vicente (1985), Diccionario etimológico español e hispánico, 2nd ed., Madrid: Espasa-Calpe (1st ed. 1954), p. s.v. maledicere
12. ^ Niermeyer, J. F. (1976), Mediae Latinitatis Lexicon Minus, Leiden: Brill, p. s.v. maledicere
13. ^ Rey, Alain, ed. (1992), Dictionnaire historique de la langue française, Paris: Le Robert, p. s.v. maudire
14. ^ a b c Porto Editora (2013), Grande Dicionário da Língua Portuguesa, Porto: Porto Editora, p. 5867
15. ^ a b Cardoso, Jerónimo (1569–1570), Dictionarium ex lusitanico in latinum sermonem, Lisboa: João Álvares (CLP transcription, Universidade de Aveiro), p. s.v. maldizer
16. ^ a b 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. maldizer
17. ^ a b Bluteau, Raphael (1712–1728), Vocabulario portuguez e latino, 8 vols. + 2 supplement vols., Coimbra / Lisboa (CLP transcription, Universidade de Aveiro), p. s.v. maldizer
18. ^ a b Ferreira, Aurélio Buarque de Holanda, Novo dicionário Aurélio da língua portuguesa, digital edition, p. s.v. maldizer
19. ^ Centro de Linguística da Universidade de Lisboa, CTA – Corpus de Textos Antigos, https://teitok.clul.ul.pt/cta, p. s.v. maldizer
20. ^ a b c 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. maldizer
21. ^ a b c Dicionário Priberam da Língua Portuguesa, Lisboa: Priberam Informática, https://dicionario.priberam.org, p. s.v. maldizer
22. ^ 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. maldizer