ruivo

Forms

ruivo (feminine ruiva, masculine plural ruivos, feminine plural ruivas)^[1] Old forms include ruyuo, royuo, rruujo and ruvho (14th century).^[2] Houaiss adds rroyua and rruyvo from the same century.^[3]

Etymology

It is inherited from Latin rubeus (“red, reddish”).^[3][2][4][1] Houaiss notes that in the spoken Latin behind the Romance languages this adjective replaced the classical ruber (“red”).^[3][5] Aurélio marks the etymology as possible.^[6]

The same Latin word is Galician rubio, Spanish rubio “blond”, Catalan roig, French rouge and Romanian roib “bay horse”, and Old Italian had robbio.^[7][1][8]

The Latin adjective is formed from rubeō (“to be red”).^[5][1] The family goes back to Proto-Indo-European *h₁rewdʰ- (“red”), the root of the English word red.^[1][5]

Earliest recorded meaning

Houaiss's earliest date, 1007, is the form ruiuas in a Latin charter.^[3] The Portuguese adjective is recorded from the 14th century.^[2][3]

Semantic evolution

The word has always named the colour between yellow and red, above all of hair, beards and the coats of animals.^[3][9] Pereira (1697) already lists ruivo as a fish, the gurnard, and Houaiss dates that sense to before 1720.^[10][3] Vieira collects proverbs that distrust the red-haired, among them ruivo de mau pello, mette o demo no capello, and the weather saying manhã ruiva, ou vento ou chuva “a red morning brings wind or rain”.^[11]

In Brazil the noun also names a pasture grass and the brown howler monkey.^[3][6]

Timeline

• 1007 – ruiuas in a Latin charter.^[3]
• 14th century – first Portuguese records, as ruyuo, royuo and ruivo.^[2][3]
• 1567 – a private letter has Ruivo.^[12]
• 1697 – Pereira lists ruivo as a fish.^[10]
• 1755 – Folqman glosses it with Latin rufus.^[13]
• 1789 – Morais has cabello ruivo and barba ruiva.^[9]
• 1844 – first record of arruivado.^[2]

Meanings

Adjective

1. Of a colour between yellow and red; reddish yellow.^[3][6]
2. Of hair: red, auburn, ginger; of a person: red-haired: uma menina ruiva.^[3][14][1]

Noun

1. A redhead.^[3][14][1]
2. (fishing) A gurnard, one of several red fishes of the family Triglidae.^[3][14][15]
3. (Brazil) A pasture grass, Aristida capillacea.^[6][14]
4. (Brazil) The brown howler monkey, the bugio.^[3][16]

Word family

• arruivado

Related words

• rubro
• Latin rubeus
• Galician rubio

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 Cunha, Antônio Geraldo da (2010), Dicionário etimológico da língua portuguesa, 4th ed., Rio de Janeiro: Lexikon, p. s.v. ruivo
3. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o Houaiss, Antônio; Villar, Mauro de Salles (2001), Dicionário Houaiss da língua portuguesa, Rio de Janeiro: Objetiva, p. s.v. ruivo
4. ^ Nascentes, Antenor (1966), Dicionário etimológico resumido, Rio de Janeiro: Instituto Nacional do Livro, p. s.v. ruivo
5. ^ a b c Rey, Alain, ed. (1992), Dictionnaire historique de la langue française, Paris: Le Robert, p. s.v. rouge
6. ^ a b c d Ferreira, Aurélio Buarque de Holanda, Novo dicionário Aurélio da língua portuguesa, digital edition, p. s.v. ruivo
7. ^ Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter, p. 7408
8. ^ Corominas, Joan; Pascual, José A. (1980–1991), Diccionario crítico etimológico castellano e hispánico, 6 vols., Madrid: Gredos, p. 5, 80
9. ^ 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, 361
10. ^ 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. ruivo
11. ^ Vieira, Frei Domingos (1871–1874), Grande Diccionario Portuguez ou Thesouro da lingua portugueza, 5 vols., Porto: Ernesto Chardron e Bartholomeu H. de Moraes, p. 5, 353
12. ^ 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. ruivo
13. ^ Folqman, Carlos (1755), Diccionario portuguez, e latino, Lisboa: Régia Officina Silviana (CLP transcription, Universidade de Aveiro), p. s.v. ruivo
14. ^ a b c d 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. ruivo
15. ^ Porto Editora (2013), Grande Dicionário da Língua Portuguesa, Porto: Porto Editora, p. 8202
16. ^ 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. ruivo