país

Forms

país m (plural países)^[1] Houaiss records pays and paises in the 15th century and paiz in 1597–1617.^[2] Vieira (1871–1874) still heads the word PAÍS, ou PAIZ.^[3]

Etymology

It is borrowed from French pays (“region, country”), which is recorded in French from the 10th century.^[2][4][5][1] The French word is from Late Latin pagensis (“villager”), an adjective of Latin pāgus (“village, rural district”).^[2][4][1] Nascentes explains it as “the land of a district”, with ager (“field”) understood.^[5]

The scholars of the 19th century disagreed: Adolfo Coelho took the word straight from the Latin noun and Cortesão from the adjective, while Gonçalves Viana, Meyer-Lübke and Nunes derived it from French.^[6] The inherited descendant of the Latin noun is pago.^[1] The Spanish país also comes from French.^[7]

Wiktionary derives the Latin noun from Proto-Indo-European *peh₂ǵ- (“to fasten, fix”), perhaps as “a space with fixed boundaries”.^[1]

Earliest recorded meaning

Houaiss dates the word to the 15th century, from Cunha's medieval index, with the forms pays and paises.^[2] A private letter of 1542 writes pays.^[8] Cunha gives the 17th century.^[4]

Semantic evolution

Vieira (1871–1874) defines it as land, region, kingdom or a small tract of land, and quotes paizes de Flandres from Jacinto Freire de Andrade.^[3] The sense “nation, a territory with its own history and name” is now the main one, beside “homeland” and the people of a nation.^[2][9] Figuratively it is a milieu or an area without fixed limits (o país das ilusões), and in painting a landscape.^[2]

Timeline

• 15th century – pays and paises.^[2]
• 1542 – pays in a private letter.^[8]
• 1597–1617 – the spelling paiz.^[2]
• 1836 – first record of paisagista.^[4]
• 1871 – Vieira heads the word PAÍS, ou PAIZ.^[3]

Meanings

Noun

1. A region, a land or territory.^[2][9]
2. A country, a nation: a territory with defined borders inhabited by a people with its own history.^[2][10][1]
3. One's homeland, pátria.^[2][11]
4. The people of a nation: o país inteiro votou.^[2][10]
5. A milieu, a setting: sentir-se fora do seu país.^[2][9]
6. (art) A painting of a region, a paisagem.^[2]

Related words

• paisagem
• paisano
• pago
• French pays
• Latin pāgus

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 l m n Houaiss, Antônio; Villar, Mauro de Salles (2001), Dicionário Houaiss da língua portuguesa, Rio de Janeiro: Objetiva, p. s.v. país
3. ^ a b c 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, 630
4. ^ a b c d Cunha, Antônio Geraldo da (2010), Dicionário etimológico da língua portuguesa, 4th ed., Rio de Janeiro: Lexikon, p. s.v. país
5. ^ a b Nascentes, Antenor (1966), Dicionário etimológico resumido, Rio de Janeiro: Instituto Nacional do Livro, p. s.v. país
6. ^ Nascentes, Antenor (1955), Dicionário etimológico da língua portuguesa, vol. 1: Nomes comuns, Rio de Janeiro (1st ed. 1932, preface by W. Meyer-Lübke), p. 373
7. ^ García de Diego, Vicente (1985), Diccionario etimológico español e hispánico, 2nd ed., Madrid: Espasa-Calpe (1st ed. 1954), p. s.v. pagensis
8. ^ a b 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. país
9. ^ a b c Ferreira, Aurélio Buarque de Holanda, Novo dicionário Aurélio da língua portuguesa, digital edition, p. s.v. país
10. ^ a b 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. país
11. ^ Dicionário Priberam da Língua Portuguesa, Lisboa: Priberam Informática, https://dicionario.priberam.org, p. s.v. país