penha

Forms

penha f (plural penhas)^[1] The native form was pena, pẽna in the 14th century.^[2][1]

Etymology

It is borrowed from Spanish peña (“rock, crag”), recorded in Spanish from 945.^[3][2][4][1] It displaced the inherited Old Galician-Portuguese pena, which survives as Galician pena.^[1][2] The Spanish word is from Latin pinna (“feather; battlement”): the rocks that bristle on the crest of a mountain were compared to the battlements of a fortress.^[5][6] Houaiss traces the sense to the Latin noun's uses for anything shaped like a feather or wing.^[3] Niermeyer records the Latin word in Medieval Latin for “rock, hill”.^[7]

An older view, from Leite de Vasconcelos and given by Nascentes in 1955 and still by Michaelis, derived the word from a Latin form with -nn- from a Celtic word for “head”.^[8][9]

The Oxford Latin Dictionary takes the Latin noun as probably a dialect variant of penna (“feather”).^[10] Wiktionary suggests a merger of two etyma, one going back to Proto-Indo-European *péth₂r̥ (“feather, wing”).^[11]

Earliest recorded meaning

Houaiss records the form penha first in 1589.^[3] His earliest date, 1068, is for the place name Penalonga with the native form, and Cunha has pẽna “rock” in the 14th century.^[3][2] The sense is “rock, crag”.^[2]

Semantic evolution

The word has kept the sense of a large rock or crag: Pereira (1697) and Bluteau (1712–1728) render it with Latin rupes.^[12][13] Houaiss defines it in geomorphology as a large isolated rock standing out on a slope or ridge.^[3] Bluteau also records the cult of Nossa Senhora da Penha de França, named after a mountain between Salamanca and Ciudad Rodrigo where an image of the Virgin was found about 1490, and carried to a convent in Lisbon.^[13] Nascentes notes that the hill of Penha in Rio de Janeiro is named after the church of Our Lady of Penha on its top, a devotion that came from Spain to Portugal and then to Brazil.^[14]

Timeline

• 1068 – Houaiss's earliest date, the place name Penalonga.^[3]
• 14th century – the native pẽna “rock”.^[2]
• 1589 – first record of penha.^[3]
• 1644 – penhas in a private letter.^[15]
• 1665 – Houaiss's first date for the derivative penhasco.^[16]
• 1697 – Pereira renders it with Latin rupes.^[12]

Meanings

Noun

1. A large isolated mass of rock jutting out on a hillside or ridge; a crag, penhasco, penedo.^[3][17][1]
2. A rock, a stone outcrop.^[18][19]

Related words

• penhasco
• pena
• Latin pinna
• Spanish peña

Usage notes

In Portugal a dialect survey recorded penha also for a spring of water.^[20] As a place name and a surname, Penha often refers to Our Lady of Penha.^[14]

References

1. ^ a b c d e f g h i Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f Cunha, Antônio Geraldo da (2010), Dicionário etimológico da língua portuguesa, 4th ed., Rio de Janeiro: Lexikon, p. s.v. pena
3. ^ 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. penha
4. ^ Nascentes, Antenor (1966), Dicionário etimológico resumido, Rio de Janeiro: Instituto Nacional do Livro, p. s.v. penha
5. ^ Corominas, Joan; Pascual, José A. (1980–1991), Diccionario crítico etimológico castellano e hispánico, 6 vols., Madrid: Gredos, p. 4, 477
6. ^ Corominas, Joan (1973), Breve diccionario etimológico de la lengua castellana, 3rd ed., Madrid: Gredos, p. s.v. peña
7. ^ Niermeyer, J. F. (1976), Mediae Latinitatis Lexicon Minus, Leiden: Brill, p. s.v. pinna
8. ^ Nascentes, Antenor (1955), Dicionário etimológico da língua portuguesa, vol. 1: Nomes comuns, Rio de Janeiro (1st ed. 1932, preface by W. Meyer-Lübke), p. 389
9. ^ 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. penha
10. ^ Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press, p. s.v. pinna
11. ^ Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org, p. s.v. pinna
12. ^ a b 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. penha
13. ^ a b Bluteau, Raphael (1712–1728), Vocabulario portuguez e latino, 8 vols. + 2 supplement vols., Coimbra / Lisboa (CLP transcription, Universidade de Aveiro), p. s.v. penha
14. ^ a b Nascentes, Antenor (1952), Dicionário etimológico da língua portuguesa, vol. 2: Nomes próprios, Rio de Janeiro, p. 273
15. ^ 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. penha
16. ^ Houaiss, Antônio; Villar, Mauro de Salles (2001), Dicionário Houaiss da língua portuguesa, Rio de Janeiro: Objetiva, p. s.v. penhasco
17. ^ Ferreira, Aurélio Buarque de Holanda, Novo dicionário Aurélio da língua portuguesa, digital edition, p. s.v. penha
18. ^ Dicionário Priberam da Língua Portuguesa, Lisboa: Priberam Informática, https://dicionario.priberam.org, p. s.v. penha
19. ^ Porto Editora (2013), Grande Dicionário da Língua Portuguesa, Porto: Porto Editora, p. 7046
20. ^ 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. penha