moio

Forms

moio m (plural moios)^[1] The medieval texts write moyo, plural moyos, and Houaiss also records mojos in 1392.^[2][3] The spelling moyo heads the word in Cardoso (1569) and Pereira (1697), while Morais (1789) refers moyo to moio.^[4][5][6]

Etymology

It is inherited from Latin modius (“a dry measure, peck”), written Old Galician-Portuguese moyo in the oldest texts.^[3][7][8][1] The DDGM's glossary of the Crónica Geral gives the same etymon and follows the word back to Latin charters of the 11th century.^[2]

The same Latin word is Galician moio, Spanish moyo, Italian moggio and French muid.^[9][1][10] García de Diego records moyo as an old Castilian word and treats modio as a learned form.^[11]

In Latin the noun was formed modus (“measure”) with the suffix -ius.^[1][12] De Vaan traces the Latin noun to Proto-Italic *medo- and to a Proto-Indo-European noun *med-o- (“measure”), from the root *med-.^[13]

Earliest recorded meaning

Latin charters already use the Romance form: one of 1080 has per suos moios “by their moios” and one of 1115 a price of ten moios.^[2] Houaiss dates the Portuguese noun to 1255 from Cunha's slips of the medieval vocabulary.^[3] The vernacular records of the 13th century use it for grain and salt: e XXX moyos de pan meyado “and thirty moios of mixed bread-corn” in 1268, and oyto moyos de sal “eight moios of salt” in 1296.^[2]

Semantic evolution

In the Middle Ages the moio was a measure of grain, wine and salt, and in the Crónica Troiana a measure of liquids, used hyperbolically for mill moyos de sange “a thousand moios of blood”.^[2] Its size varied by province; the dictionaries settled on sixty alqueires, about 828 litres in Lisbon.^[14][15][16] Priberam glosses it as what a millstone can grind in one day.^[17] It was also a measure of land.^[18]

From the measure of sixty alqueires the word came to mean “a set of sixty” in the sale of goods (fruit, melons), and then any sixty things, even years.^[16][3] The DLP labels this use regional, and Wiktionary colloquial.^[19][1] In Galicia moio is a wine measure of eight olas, a count of 120 roof tiles and a measure of twelve ferrados of grain.^[20] Galician notarial books of the 15th century already count tiles by the moyo.^[2]

Timeline

• 1080 – a Latin charter writes per suos moios.^[2]
• 1255 – Houaiss's first date for the Portuguese word.^[3]
• 1268 – e XXX moyos de pan meyado in a Portuguese document.^[2]
• 1296 – oyto moyos de sal.^[2]
• 1392 – the plurals mojos and moyos.^[3]
• 1448 – Galician records count roof tiles in moyos.^[2]
• 1541 – the plural moyos in a private letter.^[21]
• 1569 – Cardoso renders Moyo by Latin modius magnus “great modius”.^[4]
• 1734 – Feijó defines the moyo as sixty alqueires.^[14]
• 1789 – Morais refers moyo to the spelling moio.^[6]
• 1871–1874 – Vieira notes that the measure varied by province.^[15]

Meanings

Noun

1. (historical) An old unit of dry capacity, equal to sixty alqueires, used for grain and salt.^[3][22][1]
2. (regional) A set of sixty things of the same kind, in the sale of goods.^[3][19]
3. (regional) Sixty years of age.^[3][16]
4. (Estremadura) moio de sacas: ten empty sacks.^[3]

Related words

• módio
• modo
• Latin modius
• Galician moio
• Spanish moyo

Usage notes

Houaiss and Wikcionário also record a separate Angolan interjection moio “good morning; goodbye”, a 20th-century borrowing from Lunda-Chokwe.^[3][23] Wikcionário traces the Chokwe word to a Proto-Bantu noun for “life, spirit, heart”.^[23]

References

1. ^ a b c d e f g h Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j 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. moyo
3. ^ 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. moio
4. ^ a b Cardoso, Jerónimo (1569–1570), Dictionarium ex lusitanico in latinum sermonem, Lisboa: João Álvares (CLP transcription, Universidade de Aveiro), p. s.v. moyo
5. ^ 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. moyo
6. ^ 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, 102
7. ^ Cunha, Antônio Geraldo da (2010), Dicionário etimológico da língua portuguesa, 4th ed., Rio de Janeiro: Lexikon, p. s.v. moio
8. ^ Nascentes, Antenor (1966), Dicionário etimológico resumido, Rio de Janeiro: Instituto Nacional do Livro, p. s.v. moio
9. ^ Nascentes, Antenor (1955), Dicionário etimológico da língua portuguesa, vol. 1: Nomes comuns, Rio de Janeiro (1st ed. 1932, preface by W. Meyer-Lübke), p. 338
10. ^ Real Academia Española; Asociación de Academias de la Lengua Española (2014–), Diccionario de la lengua española, 23rd ed., online version 23.8, https://dle.rae.es, p. s.v. moyo
11. ^ García de Diego, Vicente (1985), Diccionario etimológico español e hispánico, 2nd ed., Madrid: Espasa-Calpe (1st ed. 1954), p. s.v. modius
12. ^ Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press, p. s.v. modius
13. ^ de Vaan, Michiel (2008), Etymological Dictionary of Latin and the other Italic Languages, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 7, Leiden; Boston: Brill
14. ^ a b Feijó, João de Morais Madureira (1734), Orthographia, ou Arte de escrever, e pronunciar com acerto a lingua portugueza, Lisboa (CLP transcription, Universidade de Aveiro), p. s.v. moyo
15. ^ a b 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, 291
16. ^ a b c Aulete, Francisco Júlio Caldas, Dicionário contemporâneo da língua portuguesa (1st ed. 1881), online as Aulete Digital, Rio de Janeiro: Lexikon, https://aulete.com.br, p. s.v. moio
17. ^ Dicionário Priberam da Língua Portuguesa, Lisboa: Priberam Informática, https://dicionario.priberam.org, p. s.v. moio
18. ^ 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. moio
19. ^ a b 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. moio
20. ^ Estraviz, Isaac Alonso, Dicionário Estraviz, https://estraviz.org, p. s.v. moio
21. ^ 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. moio
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. moio
23. ^ a b Wikcionário (Portuguese Wiktionary), pt.wiktionary.org