melhorar

Forms

melhorar (first-person singular present melhoro, first-person singular preterite melhorei, past participle melhorado)^[1] Old Galician-Portuguese wrote both melhorar and mellorar.^[2][3]

Etymology

It is inherited from Late Latin meliōrō (“to improve”), written Old Galician-Portuguese melhorar and Old Galician-Portuguese mellorar in the oldest texts.^[2][3][1] The Late Latin verb is formed from Latin melior (“better”).^[2][4][1] Latin /lj/ became the palatal /ʎ/, written ⟨lh⟩ or ⟨ll⟩, as in melhor.^[2][3]

The same Latin verb is Galician mellorar, Spanish mejorar, Catalan millorar, Occitan melhorar and Italian migliorare.^[5][1] Portuguese and Spanish medrar “to thrive” is another outcome of the same Latin verb.^[5][6][1]

The Latin adjective served as the comparative of bonus (“good”).^[4] De Vaan reconstructs Proto-Indo-European *mel-iōs and compares Greek μάλα (mála, “very”), but calls the etymology weak, since words for “good” are often renewed.^[7]

Earliest recorded meaning

Houaiss and Cunha date the verb to the 13th century.^[2][3] In the cantigas d'amigo it means “to make better” and so “to forgive an offence”: Martin de Padrozelos has se de mi queixum' avedes, / por Deus, que o melhoredes “if you have a grievance against me, for God's sake forgive it”.^[8][9] A cantiga of Afonso X has se o m'eu melhoro, faço ben “if I make it better for myself, I do well”.^[8]

Semantic evolution

Barbosa (1611) has the verb both for “to make better” and for “to get better”, and melhorar na doença “to recover from an illness”.^[10] Bluteau (1712–1728) adds a legal sense: melhorar no testamento a child is to leave that child a larger share of the inheritance, within what the law allows.^[11] Morais (1789) records it for trade and farming, and for being promoted to a better post.^[12]

Today the verb also says that the weather clears up or calms down.^[2][13] The derivatives melhora “improvement in health” and melhoramento go back to the medieval language.^[3]

Timeline

• 13th century – first record, in the cantigas.^[2][3][8]
• 14th century – the spelling melhorar.^[2]
• 1611 – Barbosa has melhorar na doença “to recover from an illness”.^[10]
• 1712–1728 – Bluteau records melhorar no testamento.^[11]
• 1789 – Morais records the sense “to be promoted to a better post”.^[12]

Meanings

Verb

1. (transitive, intransitive) To change for the better; to improve, prosper: melhorar de vida.^[2][14][1]
2. (transitive, pronominal) To make or become better; to perfect: Precisas de melhorar a letra.^[2][15]
3. (transitive, intransitive) To recover or help recover from an illness: O doente melhorou durante a noite.^[2][14]
4. (intransitive, of weather) To clear up, calm down.^[2][13]

Word family

• melhora
• melhoramento

Related words

• melhor
• medrar
• Latin melior
• Galician mellorar
• Spanish mejorar

References

1. ^ a b c d e f g h i j Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l Houaiss, Antônio; Villar, Mauro de Salles (2001), Dicionário Houaiss da língua portuguesa, Rio de Janeiro: Objetiva, p. s.v. melhorar
3. ^ a b c d e f Cunha, Antônio Geraldo da (2010), Dicionário etimológico da língua portuguesa, 4th ed., Rio de Janeiro: Lexikon, p. s.v. melhor
4. ^ a b Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press, p. s.v. melior
5. ^ a b Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter, p. 5480
6. ^ García de Diego, Vicente (1985), Diccionario etimológico español e hispánico, 2nd ed., Madrid: Espasa-Calpe (1st ed. 1954), p. s.v. meliorare
7. ^ de Vaan, Michiel (2008), Etymological Dictionary of Latin and the other Italic Languages, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 7, Leiden; Boston: Brill, p. s.v. melior
8. ^ a b c 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. melhorar
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. melhorar
10. ^ a b Barbosa, Agostinho (1611), Dictionarium lusitanicolatinum, Braga: Fructuoso Lourenço de Basto (CLP transcription, Universidade de Aveiro), p. s.v. melhorar
11. ^ 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. melhorar
12. ^ 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, 71
13. ^ a b Dicionário Priberam da Língua Portuguesa, Lisboa: Priberam Informática, https://dicionario.priberam.org, p. s.v. melhorar
14. ^ a b Ferreira, Aurélio Buarque de Holanda, Novo dicionário Aurélio da língua portuguesa, digital edition, p. s.v. melhorar
15. ^ 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. melhorar