pólvora

Forms

pólvora f (plural pólvoras)^[1]

Etymology

It is borrowed from Spanish pólvora (“gunpowder”), which goes back to Catalan pólvora (“dust, powder”).^[2][3][4][1] The Catalan word continues Late Latin pulvera, a neuter plural formed on Latin pulvis (“dust”).^[2][1] Houaiss dates the Catalan word, still meaning “dust”, to the 13th century and the Spanish one to 1350, and explains the ⟨o⟩ of the second syllable as a Catalan assimilation of the unstressed ⟨e⟩ to the stressed ⟨ó⟩.^[2] Corominas finds the Catalan word for “dust” or “powders” from the end of the 13th century, while Spanish has it from about 1350 only in the narrower sense of the explosive mixture.^[5][6]

Nascentes's fuller dictionary gives another view: with Adolfo Coelho and Meyer-Lübke he derives the Portuguese word directly from the Latin plural and puts the vowel assimilation in Portuguese, noting that Cortesão derived it from Spanish.^[7] The same Latin word is Italian polvere, Romanian pulbere, French poudre and Spanish polvo.^[7][8] Portuguese pó is its inherited doublet, from Vulgar Latin *pulus.^[9][1]

De Vaan reconstructs a Proto-Italic stem for the Latin word and mentions the derivation from Proto-Indo-European *pelH-u- (“chaff”) proposed by Walde–Hofmann and Pokorny, but reports Schrijver's doubt about the link between “dust” and “chaff”.^[10]

Earliest recorded meaning

Houaiss dates the word to the 15th century from Cunha's index of medieval texts, in the spellings polvora and poluora, already as the explosive.^[2] Corominas notes that the first use of gunpowder in Europe is reported in 1331, in northern Italy.^[5]

Semantic evolution

Morais defines the word as a mixture of saltpetre, sulphur and charcoal that drives the bullet when fire reaches it, and distinguishes the coarser powder of bombards from that of muskets.^[11] Vieira enters it as a term of artillery.^[12] Feijó's spelling guide of 1734 sets Pólvora against the popular polvra.^[13]

In Brazil the name passed to a tiny biting midge, also called maruim or birigui, from its likeness to a grain of powder.^[2][14][15] It also names a kind of green tea, gunpowder tea.^[1][15] Figurative phrases include descobrir a pólvora “to discover gunpowder”, said of someone who announces what everybody already knew, and brincar com pólvora “to play with gunpowder”, to court danger.^[2][15]

Timeline

• 13th century – Catalan pólvora “dust”.^[2]
• c. 1350 – first record of Spanish pólvora, in the Poema de Alfonso XI.^[5]
• 15th century – first Portuguese records, spelt polvora and poluora.^[2]
• 1628 – a private letter spells it pollvora.^[16]
• 1734 – Feijó prescribes Pólvora against polvra.^[13]
• 1789 – Morais describes its composition and its grades.^[11]

Meanings

Noun

1. gunpowder: an explosive mixture of saltpetre (salitre), sulphur (enxofre) and charcoal (carvão).^{[2][15][17][1]}
2. Any of the explosives used as a propellant in firearms and other weapons.^[2][4]
3. (Brazil) A tiny biting midge, the maruim.^[2][15]
4. gunpowder tea, a variety of green tea.^[1][15]

Word family

• polvorim

Related words

• pó
• pulverizar
• polvilho
• Latin pulvis
• Spanish pólvora

References

1. ^ a b c d e f g h i j Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ 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. pólvora
3. ^ Nascentes, Antenor (1966), Dicionário etimológico resumido, Rio de Janeiro: Instituto Nacional do Livro, p. s.v. pólvora
4. ^ a b Ferreira, Aurélio Buarque de Holanda, Novo dicionário Aurélio da língua portuguesa, digital edition, p. s.v. pólvora
5. ^ a b c Corominas, Joan; Pascual, José A. (1980–1991), Diccionario crítico etimológico castellano e hispánico, 6 vols., Madrid: Gredos, p. 4, 599
6. ^ Corominas, Joan (1973), Breve diccionario etimológico de la lengua castellana, 3rd ed., Madrid: Gredos, p. s.v. polvo
7. ^ 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. 409
8. ^ Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter, p. 6842
9. ^ Cunha, Antônio Geraldo da (2010), Dicionário etimológico da língua portuguesa, 4th ed., Rio de Janeiro: Lexikon, p. s.v. pó
10. ^ de Vaan, Michiel (2008), Etymological Dictionary of Latin and the other Italic Languages, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 7, Leiden; Boston: Brill
11. ^ 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, 214
12. ^ 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, 830
13. ^ 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. pólvora
14. ^ 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. pólvora
15. ^ a b c d e f Dicionário Priberam da Língua Portuguesa, Lisboa: Priberam Informática, https://dicionario.priberam.org, p. s.v. pólvora
16. ^ 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. pólvora
17. ^ Porto Editora (2013), Grande Dicionário da Língua Portuguesa, Porto: Porto Editora, p. 7323