nós

Forms

nós m pl or f pl by sense^[1] Old Galician-Portuguese wrote nos.^[2] Houaiss records nos in 1192 and in the 13th century, and nós from the 14th.^[2] Feijó (1734) explains that the stressed pronoun takes the accent, while the unstressed object form nos (isso não nos pertence) does not.^[3] Colloquial Brazilian speech also has the spelling nóis.^[1]

Etymology

It is inherited from Latin nōs (“we, us”), written Old Galician-Portuguese nos in the oldest texts.^[2][4][5][1] Cunha and Nascentes take the stressed pronoun from the stressed use of the Latin word, and the unstressed object pronoun nos from its unstressed use.^[4][5][6]

The same Latin word is Galician nós, Spanish nos, Catalan nos, French nous, Italian noi and Romanian noi.^[7][8] In medieval Spanish it often took the form Old Spanish mos, which the REW and García de Diego explain by the influence of me.^[7][8]

The Latin word goes back to *nōs.^[1][9] De Vaan reconstructs it as an accusative Proto-Indo-European *nōs, and the OLD compares Tocharian A nās, Ancient Greek νῶϊ (nôï, “we two”) and, in the zero grade, Gothic 𐌿𐌽𐍃 (uns) and English us.^[9][10]

Earliest recorded meaning

The DDGM, after Lorenzo, records the form nós from the end of the 12th century, in a Portuguese text of 1192, and then in the Cantigas de Santa Maria.^[11] In the cantigas it is the subject of a verb, a complement after a preposition, and the second term of a comparison: e quen for loada come nós “and whoever is praised as we are”.^[12]

Semantic evolution

The notarial deeds of Noia in Galicia, from 1341, already use nós for a single speaker in the plural of majesty, and in a deed from Rianjo an abbot names himself so: Como nós, dõ frey Lopo de Mõtouto, abade de Sã Justo “as we, Friar Lopo of Montouto, abbot of San Justo”.^[11] The reinforced nós outros “we others” appears in the Crónica Geral, in the chronicle of 1344 and in Galician texts of the 15th century, and nosoutros survives in Galician dialects.^[11] Maia took these forms for Castilianisms, but Lorenzo rejected that view.^[11] Vieira, in the 1870s, derived nós-outros from French.^[13]

Royal documents opened with Nos elRei fazemos saber “we the King make known” until 16 June 1524, when King João III had the formula changed to the singular, as Morais records.^[14] The dictionaries of today still list the plural of majesty and the plural of modesty used by authors, and the DLP adds the use for the speaker together with his contemporaries or mankind in general.^[15][16][17] In colloquial Brazilian Portuguese, nós is also used as a direct object, a use the grammars condemn.^[1]

Timeline

• 1192 – first record of the pronoun, nos, in a Portuguese text.^[2][11]
• 13th century – the Cantigas de Santa Maria and the secular cantigas use nós.^[11][12][4]
• 1341 – notarial deeds of Noia write nós as subject and after prepositions, sometimes for a single person.^[11]
• 1524 – King João III replaces the royal formula Nos elRei with the singular.^[14]
• 1697 – Pereira glosses Nós with Latin nos, nostrum, vel nostri.^[18]
• 1734 – Feijó distinguishes the accented pronoun from the unaccented nos.^[3]
• 1813 – Morais defines nós as the plural of eu.^[14]

Meanings

Pronoun

1. we: the first person plural, the speaker together with one or more others, as the subject of a verb: Nós saímos de manhã.^[2][19][1]
2. As a predicate after ser: Os culpados somos nós.^[2][17]
3. us, after a preposition: Ela pensou em nós. With com it becomes conosco (Brazil) or connosco (Portugal).^[2][19][1]
4. The second term of a comparison: Eles sabem tanto como nós.^[17][12]
5. Used instead of eu as a majestic plural, or by an author as a plural of modesty.^[15][16][20]
6. The speaker and his contemporaries, or people in general: Nós, humanos, somos frágeis.^[17]
7. (Brazil, colloquial) Used as a direct object: us.^[1]

Related words

• nos
• nosso
• vós
• Latin nōs
• Galician nós

Usage notes

In everyday Portuguese, especially in Brazil, a gente often stands for nós.^[2] The plural of the noun nó “knot” is also spelt nós, and Morais notes that nós could be written for noz “walnut”.^[14][1]

References

1. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h Houaiss, Antônio; Villar, Mauro de Salles (2001), Dicionário Houaiss da língua portuguesa, Rio de Janeiro: Objetiva, p. s.v. nós
3. ^ 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. nós
4. ^ a b c Cunha, Antônio Geraldo da (2010), Dicionário etimológico da língua portuguesa, 4th ed., Rio de Janeiro: Lexikon, p. s.v. nos
5. ^ a b Nascentes, Antenor (1966), Dicionário etimológico resumido, Rio de Janeiro: Instituto Nacional do Livro, p. s.v. nós
6. ^ Ferreira, Aurélio Buarque de Holanda, Novo dicionário Aurélio da língua portuguesa, digital edition, p. s.v. nós
7. ^ a b Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter, p. 5960
8. ^ a b García de Diego, Vicente (1985), Diccionario etimológico español e hispánico, 2nd ed., Madrid: Espasa-Calpe (1st ed. 1954), p. s.v. nos
9. ^ a b de Vaan, Michiel (2008), Etymological Dictionary of Latin and the other Italic Languages, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 7, Leiden; Boston: Brill
10. ^ Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
11. ^ a b c d e f g 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. nós
12. ^ a b c 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. nós
13. ^ 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, 462
14. ^ a b c d Silva, António de Morais (1813), Diccionario da lingua portugueza, 2nd ed., 2 vols., Lisboa: Typographia Lacerdina, p. 2, 347
15. ^ a b Dicionário Priberam da Língua Portuguesa, Lisboa: Priberam Informática, https://dicionario.priberam.org, p. s.v. nós
16. ^ a b Porto Editora (2013), Grande Dicionário da Língua Portuguesa, Porto: Porto Editora, p. 6555
17. ^ 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. nós
18. ^ 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. nós
19. ^ a b 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. nós
20. ^ 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. nós