noviço

Forms

noviço m (plural noviços)^[1] Medieval texts also write nouiços, novicio and nouviços.^[2]

Etymology

It is borrowed from Late Latin novīcius (“novice”), the masculine of the Latin adjective, “new, recent”, used as a noun; the oldest texts write Old Galician-Portuguese noviço.^[2][3][1] The Latin adjective is formed from novus (“new”) with the suffix -īcius, and in Plautus meant “newly imported”, said of slaves; the DLP glosses it “recently made a slave”.^[4][1][5] In church Latin the noun was the novice of a religious order.^[6] The adjective goes back to *nowos, from Proto-Indo-European *néwos (“new”), the source also of Ancient Greek νέος (néos), Sanskrit नव (náva) and the English word new.^[4][1]

The same Latin word is Spanish novicio, Galician novizo, French novice and Italian novizio, and Old Italian had novizia “bride”.^[7][1] Corominas counts the Spanish word among the learned derivatives of the family and dates it 1220–1250.^[8]

Earliest recorded meaning

The Cantigas de Santa Maria (cantiga 365) tell of un frade noviço and un monje noviço, a novice friar and a novice monk.^[9] Lorenzo's chronology cites this record beside Machado's dating of the word to the 14th century.^[9]

Semantic evolution

Barbosa (1611) and Pereira (1697) render the word with Latin novitius and tyro “recruit, beginner”, and Bluteau (1712–1728) describes the novice who has taken the habit and is being trained in the exercises of the order before he professes, with the Mestre dos Noviços who instructs him.^[10][11][6] Bluteau's book of synonyms already sets it beside aprendiz, principiante, novel and novato, and Morais (1813) records it as an adjective and in the figurative sense “new to any activity”.^[6][12]

In Rio Grande do Sul it is said of a young horse not yet broken to ranch work and of a man new to the work of the ranch.^[13] A Brazilian survey recorded it in the sense “young”, of people and animals.^[14]

Timeline

• 13th century – un frade noviço in the Cantigas de Santa Maria.^[9][2][3]
• 14th century – the plural nouiços and the form novicio.^[2]
• 1611 – Barbosa renders it by Latin novitius.^[10]
• 1712–1728 – Bluteau describes the novice and the Mestre dos Noviços.^[6]
• 1813 – Morais records the adjective and the figurative sense.^[12]

Meanings

Noun

1. (religion) A novice: a person who has entered a religious order and spends a period of preparation in the convent before taking the final vows.^[2][5][1]
2. (figurative) A beginner in a trade or activity; a novato.^[2][15][1]

Adjective

1. inexperienced, immature or naïve.^[2][5][1]
2. (Rio Grande do Sul) Of a horse: young and not yet tried in ranch work.^[13]

Word family

• noviciado

Related words

• novo
• novato
• novel
• Latin novus
• Spanish novicio

References

1. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g Houaiss, Antônio; Villar, Mauro de Salles (2001), Dicionário Houaiss da língua portuguesa, Rio de Janeiro: Objetiva, p. s.v. noviço
3. ^ a b Cunha, Antônio Geraldo da (2010), Dicionário etimológico da língua portuguesa, 4th ed., Rio de Janeiro: Lexikon, p. s.v. noviço
4. ^ 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
5. ^ a b c 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. noviço
6. ^ a b c d Bluteau, Raphael (1712–1728), Vocabulario portuguez e latino, 8 vols. + 2 supplement vols., Coimbra / Lisboa (CLP transcription, Universidade de Aveiro), p. s.v. noviço
7. ^ Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter
8. ^ Corominas, Joan (1973), Breve diccionario etimológico de la lengua castellana, 3rd ed., Madrid: Gredos, p. s.v. nuevo
9. ^ 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. noviço
10. ^ a b Barbosa, Agostinho (1611), Dictionarium lusitanicolatinum, Braga: Fructuoso Lourenço de Basto (CLP transcription, Universidade de Aveiro), p. s.v. noviço
11. ^ 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. noviço
12. ^ a b Silva, António de Morais (1813), Diccionario da lingua portugueza, 2nd ed., 2 vols., Lisboa: Typographia Lacerdina, p. 2, 349
13. ^ a b Schlee, Aldyr Garcia (2019), Dicionário da Cultura Pampeana Sul-Rio-Grandense, 2 vols., Pelotas: Fructos do Paiz, p. s.v. noviço
14. ^ 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. noviço
15. ^ Ferreira, Aurélio Buarque de Holanda, Novo dicionário Aurélio da língua portuguesa, digital edition, p. s.v. noviço