planta

Forms

planta f (plural plantas)^[1] The 14th-century texts write planta and plãtas, and a text of before 1557 has prantas.^[2] Feijó (1734) still corrects the spelling pranta to planta.^[3]

Etymology

It is inherited from Latin planta (“sole of the foot; shoot, cutting for planting”), written Old Galician-Portuguese planta in the oldest texts.^[2][4][1] Nascentes calls it a learned word, and the REW puts the Portuguese form in brackets as a learned one, listing chanta “seedling” as the popular outcome of the Latin noun.^[5][6] Houaiss instead takes that noun as a back-formation from chantar.^[7]

The same Latin word is Galician planta, Spanish planta, Catalan planta, French plante and Italian pianta.^[6][1] Corominas takes the Spanish word as semi-learned.^[8] Through Gaelic and the English word clan, the Latin noun is also the source of Portuguese clã.^[9][1]

In Latin the word meant “sole of the foot” from Plautus on and “young shoot” from Cato on.^[10] De Vaan traces it to Proto-Italic *plāntā and a Proto-Indo-European noun “the flat one” or “the approaching one”.^[10][1] Wiktionary derives it from Proto-Indo-European *pleh₂- (“flat”).^[10][1]

Earliest recorded meaning

Lorenzo's first record is the Crónica Geral de Espanha de 1344, which praises a land “of very good plants … there are very good plants there, and many” (de muy boas plantas... ha hy muy boas plantas e muytas).^[11] The Crónica Troiana uses planta for the sole of the foot.^[11] Houaiss dates both the sense “plant” and the phrase planta do pé to the 14th century.^[2]

Semantic evolution

Cardoso's dictionary of 1562 knows the word only as the sole of the foot, while Barbosa (1611) and Pereira (1697) translate it as a plant.^[12][13][14] Bluteau (1712–1728) makes it the general name for every tree, shrub, flower and herb that grows where it springs up.^[15] Nascentes takes “plant” as the basic sense and the sole of the foot and the ground plan as figures: things that rest on the ground, as a plant does.^[5]

The architectural sense “ground plan” is dated 1679 by Houaiss.^[2] Following Corominas, he notes that this sense, recorded in Spanish in 1600, has not been studied enough: it may have arisen in Spanish and Italian side by side or have been borrowed from Italian, where it appears in the 16th century, and its starting point was probably the space a building takes up, compared to the sole of a foot.^[2] Folqman (1755) and Morais (1789) list the plant, the sole of the foot and the plan of a building, and Morais adds a painters' term for the upright stance of a human figure.^[16][17]

In north-eastern Brazil planta also means planted land and the first crop of a sugar-cane field.^[2][18] In Portugal it is used colloquially for a person's presence or appearance.^[19]

Timeline

• 1344 – de muy boas plantas in the Crónica Geral de Espanha de 1344.^[11]
• 14th century – the spellings planta and plãtas; first record of planta do pé.^[2]
• c. 1430 – the Horto do Esposo (copied 1390–1437) uses the word.^[20]
• before 1557 – the spelling prantas.^[2]
• 1562 – Cardoso glosses planta as the sole of the foot.^[12]
• 1679 – first record of the sense “ground plan of a building”.^[2]
• 1712 – Bluteau defines it as the general name of all growing things.^[15]
• 1755 – Folqman lists the plant, the sole and the plan of a building.^[16]

Meanings

Noun

1. A plant: a living organism of the plant kingdom, with chlorophyll and cellulose in its cells: Esta planta precisa de pouca água.^[2][21][1]
2. The sole of the foot, in full planta do pé.^[2][21]
3. By extension, the foot.^[21]
4. (architecture) A floor plan: a drawing of a building, a town or a machine in horizontal projection.^[2][19][1]
5. A topographic map of a small area.^[19][1]
6. (north-eastern Brazil) Planted land; a plantation (plantação).^[2][18]
7. (north-eastern Brazil) The first crop of a sugar cane field.^[2][18]
8. (Portugal, colloquial) A person's presence or appearance.^[19][1]

Related words

• plantação
• plantar
• plantio
• implantar
• chanta
• clã
• Latin planta

Usage notes

In Brazil planta also means an industrial plant or factory.^[21] Aurélio gives this sense its own article, as a loan from the English word plant.^[21]

References

1. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l 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. planta
3. ^ 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. planta
4. ^ Cunha, Antônio Geraldo da (2010), Dicionário etimológico da língua portuguesa, 4th ed., Rio de Janeiro: Lexikon, p. s.v. planta
5. ^ a b Nascentes, Antenor (1966), Dicionário etimológico resumido, Rio de Janeiro: Instituto Nacional do Livro, p. s.v. planta
6. ^ a b Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter, p. 6575
7. ^ Houaiss, Antônio; Villar, Mauro de Salles (2001), Dicionário Houaiss da língua portuguesa, Rio de Janeiro: Objetiva, p. s.v. chanta
8. ^ Corominas, Joan; Pascual, José A. (1980–1991), Diccionario crítico etimológico castellano e hispánico, 6 vols., Madrid: Gredos, p. 4, 572
9. ^ Houaiss, Antônio; Villar, Mauro de Salles (2001), Dicionário Houaiss da língua portuguesa, Rio de Janeiro: Objetiva, p. s.v. clã
10. ^ a b c 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 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. planta
12. ^ a b Cardoso, Jerónimo (1562), Dictionarium juventuti studiosae admodum frugiferum, Coimbra: João Álvares (CLP transcription, Universidade de Aveiro), p. s.v. planta
13. ^ Barbosa, Agostinho (1611), Dictionarium lusitanicolatinum, Braga: Fructuoso Lourenço de Basto (CLP transcription, Universidade de Aveiro), p. s.v. planta
14. ^ 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. planta
15. ^ 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. planta
16. ^ a b Folqman, Carlos (1755), Diccionario portuguez, e latino, Lisboa: Régia Officina Silviana (CLP transcription, Universidade de Aveiro), p. s.v. planta
17. ^ 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, 208
18. ^ a b c Navarro, Fred (2004), Dicionário do Nordeste, São Paulo: Estação Liberdade, p. s.v. planta
19. ^ a b c d Porto Editora (2013), Grande Dicionário da Língua Portuguesa, Porto: Porto Editora, p. 7245
20. ^ Centro de Linguística da Universidade de Lisboa, CTA – Corpus de Textos Antigos, https://teitok.clul.ul.pt/cta, p. s.v. planta
21. ^ a b c d e Ferreira, Aurélio Buarque de Holanda, Novo dicionário Aurélio da língua portuguesa, digital edition, p. s.v. planta