sagrado

Forms

sagrado (feminine sagrada, masculine plural sagrados, feminine plural sagradas)^[1]

Etymology

It is inherited from Latin sacrātus (“consecrated, holy”), written Old Galician-Portuguese sagrado in the oldest texts.^[2][3][4][1] The Latin word is the past participle of sacrō (“to consecrate, dedicate”), which is formed from sacer (“sacred”).^[2][5][6] In Portuguese it is also the past participle of sagrar “to consecrate”, from the same Latin verb.^[7][8]

The same Latin word is Spanish sagrado and Catalan sagrat.^[9] The noun meaning “churchyard” has a parallel in Italian sacrato.^[10]

De Vaan traces the Latin adjective to Proto-Italic *sakro- and Proto-Indo-European *sh₂k-ro- (“sacred”).^[11]

Earliest recorded meaning

In the Cantigas de Santa Maria the flesh God took is bẽeyta e sagrada “blessed and holy”, and a cantiga tells how the Moors took a Christian town and destroyed o logar sagrado “the holy place” and the altar.^[10] The same songs already use the word as a noun for the hallowed ground of a church: ao sagrado foron “they went to the sanctuary”.^[10] In a cantiga d'amigo of Martin Codax a girl sings of Vigo, no sagrado, the churchyard by the sea.^[12][10][13]

Semantic evolution

The noun “churchyard, sacred ground” lived on in Trás-os-Montes, where the dictionaries still record it.^[6][14][15] Bluteau (1712) sets the adjective against profano and notes that Latin sacer could mean “consecrated”, “accursed” or “great”, of which Portuguese has the first and the last.^[16] The modern senses go from what has been consecrated (a bishop, a church) and what belongs to religion to what is inviolable or deserves deep respect: os sagrados direitos, a sagrado duty.^[2][17]

Timeline

• 13th century – sagrado, adjective and noun, in the Cantigas de Santa Maria.^[10][2][3]
• c. 1430 – sagrado in the Horto do Esposo.^[18]
• 1541 – sagrada in a private letter.^[19]
• 1712 – Bluteau discusses the senses of Latin sacer.^[16]
• 1789 – Morais enters it as the past participle of sagrar.^[8]

Meanings

Adjective

1. Relating to God, a deity, religion or worship; sacred, holy: música sagrada.^[2][20][1]
2. consecrated: that has received a consecration.^[2][21]
3. Inviolable, not to be touched or broken.^[2][17]
4. Deserving deep respect; venerable.^[2][22]
5. (anatomy) sacral: of the region of the spine formed by the sacro.^[22]

Noun

1. That which is sacred.^[6][21]
2. A place protected from profanation.^[6]
3. (Trás-os-Montes) A churchyard, the ground in front of a church (adro).^[6][15]

Related words

• sagrar
• consagrar
• sacro
• Latin sacer
• Spanish sagrado

References

1. ^ a b c d e f Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ 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. sagrado
3. ^ a b Cunha, Antônio Geraldo da (2010), Dicionário etimológico da língua portuguesa, 4th ed., Rio de Janeiro: Lexikon, p. s.v. sagrado
4. ^ Nascentes, Antenor (1966), Dicionário etimológico resumido, Rio de Janeiro: Instituto Nacional do Livro, p. s.v. sagrado
5. ^ Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
6. ^ a b c d e 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. sagrado
7. ^ 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. sagrado
8. ^ 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, 366
9. ^ García de Diego, Vicente (1985), Diccionario etimológico español e hispánico, 2nd ed., Madrid: Espasa-Calpe (1st ed. 1954)
10. ^ a b c d e 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. sagrado
11. ^ de Vaan, Michiel (2008), Etymological Dictionary of Latin and the other Italic Languages, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 7, Leiden; Boston: Brill
12. ^ Universo Cantigas: Glosario da poesía medieval profana galego-portuguesa, A Coruña: Instituto da Lingua e Literatura (ILLA), Universidade da Coruña, https://www.universocantigas.gal, p. s.v. sagrado
13. ^ Lopes, Graça Videira; Ferreira, Manuel Pedro et al. (2011–), Cantigas Medievais Galego-Portuguesas [online database], Lisboa: Instituto de Estudos Medievais, FCSH/NOVA, https://cantigas.fcsh.unl.pt, p. s.v. sagrado
14. ^ Silva Bastos, José Timóteo da (1912), Diccionario etymologico, prosodico e orthographico da lingua portugueza, Lisboa: Parceria António Maria Pereira, p. s.v. sagrado
15. ^ a b 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. sagrado
16. ^ 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. sagrado
17. ^ a b Ferreira, Aurélio Buarque de Holanda, Novo dicionário Aurélio da língua portuguesa, digital edition, p. s.v. sagrado
18. ^ Centro de Linguística da Universidade de Lisboa, CTA – Corpus de Textos Antigos, https://teitok.clul.ul.pt/cta, p. s.v. sagrado
19. ^ 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. sagrado
20. ^ 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. sagrado
21. ^ a b Dicionário Priberam da Língua Portuguesa, Lisboa: Priberam Informática, https://dicionario.priberam.org, p. s.v. sagrado
22. ^ a b Porto Editora (2013), Grande Dicionário da Língua Portuguesa, Porto: Porto Editora, p. 8238