muito

Forms

muito (feminine muita, masculine plural muitos, feminine plural muitas)^[1] Old Galician-Portuguese wrote muito, moito and muyto, and Houaiss records mouito in 1365 and munto in the 15th century.^[2] Munto still lives in the dialects of Portugal, among them those of Trás-os-Montes.^[3][4] The shortened form mui (moy, muy) is recorded from the 13th century.^[5][6]

Etymology

It is inherited from Latin multus (“much, many”), written Old Galician-Portuguese muito and Old Galician-Portuguese moito in the oldest texts.^[2][1][7] The adverb continues the neuter multum, as the Academia's DLP notes.^[8]

The Latin /l/ before /t/ was vocalised, so that the group ⟨lt⟩ gave the diphthong of the old form, which Galician keeps, which then became the modern ⟨muito⟩.^[9][7] The nasal sound of today's /ˈmũj̃.tu/ spread to the diphthong from the initial /m/: Nascentes cites Nunes for this, adds that the old unnasalised diphthong is still heard in Trás-os-Montes and at Melgaço, and reports Otoniel Mota's view that the nasalisation began in the short form mui.^[9][1] Morais (1813) already noted that the vowel was said nasal, so that good poets rhymed ⟨munto⟩ with ⟨junto⟩, while the older poets who rhymed ⟨muito⟩ with ⟨fruito⟩ perhaps did not nasalise it.^[10] The short form arose before consonants.^[5][11]

The same Latin word is Galician moito, Spanish mucho, Catalan molt, French moult, Italian molto and Romanian mult.^[11][1] Corominas notes that Castilian too had this form before its first literature, as in the Glosas Emilianenses, and only later the modern one.^[12]

The Latin adjective goes back to *moltos.^[13][1] De Vaan mentions a possible *m(o)l-to- (“good, strong”), comparing μάλα (mála, “very”) and milns (“very many”), but judges this root etymology weak;^[13][1] Wiktionary also cites a derivation from *ml̥tós (“crumbled”).^[13][1]

Earliest recorded meaning

Houaiss's first record is of 1255.^[2] The Cantigas de Santa Maria use it both as an adjective, soffreu muit'affan “suffered much toil”, muitas vezes “many times”, and as an adverb, era muit'engẽoso “he was very clever”.^[14]

Semantic evolution

In the Cancioneiro da Ajuda it is an adjective meaning “great” and “numerous” and an adverb with nouns and verbs, and the songs already pair it with tan and use (há) muito for “a long time”.^[14] Cardoso (1569) glosses it with Latin valde “very” and Pereira (1697) with multum and valde.^[15][16] Feijó (1734) counts muyto and the short mui as correct and calls munto an error.^[17] Today it is a determiner, a pronoun, an adverb of degree, quantity, time and frequency, and a noun, o muito “a great amount”, and it forms phrases such as há muito, quando muito and muito e muito.^[2][18][19] Macanese has muto, from the Portuguese word.^[1]

Timeline

• 1255 – first record.^[2]
• 13th century – the forms moito and muyto, and the short form mui.^[2][6]
• 1365 – the form mouito.^[2]
• c. 1430 – muito in the Horto do Esposo.^[20]
• 15th century – the form munto.^[2]
• 1569 – Cardoso glosses it with Latin valde.^[15]
• 1734 – Feijó calls munto an error.^[17]
• 1813 – Morais notes the nasal vowel of mui and muito.^[10]

Meanings

Determiner

1. much, many, a lot of: muitas pessoas vieram à festa.^[2][1][8]
2. Too much, too many; excessive (excessivo).^[2][1][21]
3. Out of the ordinary; great: tiveram muita sorte.^[2]

Pronoun

1. Much, many; a great quantity or a large part of something: muitos não voltaram.^[2][1][22]

Adverb

1. very, to a high degree (before adjectives and adverbs): muito cedo, muito bonito.^[2][1][8]
2. A lot, greatly; excessively (with verbs).^[2][23]
3. For a long time; often: há muito que não o vejo.^[2][8]

Noun

1. o muito: a great quantity of something; something of great value or importance.^[2][18][19]

Word family

• muitíssimo

Related words

• mui
• multidão
• Latin multus
• Galician moito
• Spanish mucho

References

1. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p Houaiss, Antônio; Villar, Mauro de Salles (2001), Dicionário Houaiss da língua portuguesa, Rio de Janeiro: Objetiva, p. s.v. muito
3. ^ 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. muito
4. ^ García de Diego, Vicente (1985), Diccionario etimológico español e hispánico, 2nd ed., Madrid: Espasa-Calpe (1st ed. 1954), p. s.v. multus
5. ^ a b Houaiss, Antônio; Villar, Mauro de Salles (2001), Dicionário Houaiss da língua portuguesa, Rio de Janeiro: Objetiva, p. s.v. mui
6. ^ a b Cunha, Antônio Geraldo da (2010), Dicionário etimológico da língua portuguesa, 4th ed., Rio de Janeiro: Lexikon, p. s.v. mui
7. ^ a b Nascentes, Antenor (1966), Dicionário etimológico resumido, Rio de Janeiro: Instituto Nacional do Livro, p. s.v. muito
8. ^ a b c d 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. muito
9. ^ a b Nascentes, Antenor (1955), Dicionário etimológico da língua portuguesa, vol. 1: Nomes comuns, Rio de Janeiro (1st ed. 1932, preface by W. Meyer-Lübke), p. 345
10. ^ a b Silva, António de Morais (1813), Diccionario da lingua portugueza, 2nd ed., 2 vols., Lisboa: Typographia Lacerdina, p. 2, 326
11. ^ a b Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter, p. 5740
12. ^ Corominas, Joan; Pascual, José A. (1980–1991), Diccionario crítico etimológico castellano e hispánico, 6 vols., Madrid: Gredos, p. 4, 178
13. ^ a b c 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. multus
14. ^ 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. muito
15. ^ a b Cardoso, Jerónimo (1569–1570), Dictionarium ex lusitanico in latinum sermonem, Lisboa: João Álvares (CLP transcription, Universidade de Aveiro), p. s.v. muito
16. ^ 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. muito
17. ^ 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. muito
18. ^ a b Dicionário Priberam da Língua Portuguesa, Lisboa: Priberam Informática, https://dicionario.priberam.org, p. s.v. muito
19. ^ a b Schlee, Aldyr Garcia (2019), Dicionário da Cultura Pampeana Sul-Rio-Grandense, 2 vols., Pelotas: Fructos do Paiz, p. s.v. muito
20. ^ Centro de Linguística da Universidade de Lisboa, CTA – Corpus de Textos Antigos, https://teitok.clul.ul.pt/cta, p. s.v. muito
21. ^ 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. muito
22. ^ 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. muito
23. ^ Porto Editora (2013), Grande Dicionário da Língua Portuguesa, Porto: Porto Editora, p. 6361