neto

neto¹ grandson

Pronunciation

• Brazil: /ˈnɛ.tu/^[1]
• Portugal: /ˈnɛ.tu/^[1]

Forms

neto m (plural netos, feminine neta, feminine plural netas, diminutive netinho)^[1] Houaiss records netos and neytos in the 13th century and nepto in the 14th.^[2]

Etymology

The word for the grandson is a masculine made on the feminine, from Portuguese neta (“granddaughter”), written Old Galician-Portuguese neto in the oldest texts.^[2][3][1][4] The feminine continues Late Latin nepta, a form of neptis (“granddaughter; niece”), which Du Cange finds often in 8th-century capitularies.^[2][3][5] Houaiss explains that the Latin masculine nepōs (“grandson, nephew”) did not live on in Spanish and Portuguese, so a new masculine was made from the feminine.^[2] The DLP and Estraviz derive the word instead from Vulgar Latin *neptus, a remodelling of the Latin masculine, and Nascentes cites Adolfo Coelho and Nunes for that form, with a plural meaning “grandsons” in a Latin charter of 867–912.^[6][7][8]

The same pair is Galician neto and Galician neta, Spanish nieto and Spanish nieta, and Catalan net and Catalan neta.^[9][7] Corominas calls the Spanish masculine, recorded in 1062, a form proper to the Hispanic languages, drawn from the feminine.^[10]

The Latin noun goes back to *neptis, from Proto-Indo-European *néptih₂ (“grandchild, sister's son”).^[1]

Earliest recorded meaning

Latin charters already write neptos for grandsons in 867–912, and Houaiss's first date, 995, is the Latin nepta that Machado found.^[11][8][2] In Galician-Portuguese the word is recorded from the 13th century: the Cantigas de Santa Maria speak of a man who took great pleasure in his children and his grandsons (dos seus fillos e dos netos mui gran prazer recebia), and the Cancioneiro da Ajuda has it as the masculine of neta.^[11][3]

Semantic evolution

The Crónica Troiana calls Pyrrhus the neto of Peleus, and the Crónica Geral uses the word throughout.^[11] Bluteau (1712) gives terceiro neto, the son of a great-grandson.^[12] In the plural netos also means descendants, posterity.^[2][13]

In the old Portuguese bullfight the neto was the horseman who carried the president's orders.^[2][6] Portuguese slang uses the word for a glass holding five decilitres, and in the Minho it is a shoot of cabbage.^[2][6][13]

Timeline

• 867–912 – filios uel neptos “sons or grandsons” in a Latin charter.^[11][8]
• 995 – Houaiss's earliest date, the Latin form nepta, from Machado.^[2]
• 13th century – netos and neytos; the Cantigas de Santa Maria and the Cancioneiro da Ajuda use the word.^[2][11]
• 13th century – first record of bisneto “great-grandson”.^[14]
• 14th century – the latinising spelling nepto.^[2]
• c. 1430 – the Horto do Esposo (copied 1390–1437) has neto.^[15]
• 1542 – neto in a private letter.^[16]
• 1569 – Cardoso glosses Neto with Latin nepos.^[17]
• 1712 – Bluteau gives terceiro neto for Latin abnepos.^[12]
• 1789 – Morais defines it as the son of one's son or daughter.^[18]

Meanings

Noun

1. grandson: the son of one's son or daughter.^[2][1][19]
2. (in the plural) Descendants, posterity: os nossos netos.^[2][13]
3. (bullfighting, historical) In the old Portuguese bullfight, the horseman who carried the orders of the president.^[2][6]
4. (Portugal, slang) A glass holding five decilitres.^[2][6]
5. (regional, Minho) A shoot of couve.^[6][13]

Word family

• bisneto
• trineto

neto² clean, pure; net

Pronunciation

• Brazil: /ˈnɛ.tu/^[1]
• Portugal: /ˈnɛ.tu/^[1]

Forms

neto (feminine neta)^[19]

Etymology

The word for “clean, pure” is borrowed from French net (“clean, clear”).^{[2][3][20][21]} Houaiss dates the French word to 1120 and traces it to nitidus (“polished, shining; clean”), of which Portuguese nítido is the learned form.^[2] The French word is from a contracted Vulgar Latin *nittus.^[1] The Latin adjective is formed from niteō (“to shine”), and its sense “pure, clean”, first found around 400 AD, lives on in the Gallo- and Italo-Romance languages.^[1]

Nascentes (1955) instead took the Portuguese adjective straight from the Latin word, through a contracted form, citing Adolfo Coelho and Cortesão, and compared nédio “sleek”.^[8] Spanish neto is likewise a borrowing from the Catalan or French word or from Italian netto.^[22][9]

Earliest recorded meaning

Houaiss's first record is from 1443, in the sense “very clear, translucent, limpid”;^[2][3] Cunha dates the word to the 16th century.^[2][3] Morais quotes Camões's pérolas netas “flawless pearls”.^[23][13]

Semantic evolution

Morais (1813) defines the adjective as “clean, without defect”.^[23] The sense “clear, bright” is now obsolete: Aurélio quotes it from the poet Alberto de Oliveira.^[19][2] Wikcionário records a commercial sense, of a quantity counted without its packaging.^[24]

Timeline

• 1443 – Houaiss's first record.^[2]
• 16th century – Cunha's date for the adjective.^[3]
• 1813 – Morais records neto “clean, flawless”, with Camões's pérolas netas.^[23]

Meanings

Adjective

1. (obsolete) Very clear, limpid, bright; nítido.^[2][19][25]
2. clean, spotless, without defect.^[21][13]
3. smooth.^[25][24]
4. net: of a product or weight counted without its packaging.^[24]