sarar

Forms

sarar (first-person singular present saro, first-person singular preterite sarei, past participle sarado)^[1] Old Galician-Portuguese had sãar, saar and sar, and Houaiss records saar and sarar side by side in the 14th century.^[2][3][4]

Etymology

It is inherited from Latin sānō (“to heal, make sound”), through the old forms Old Galician-Portuguese sãar and, after an intermediate stage, Old Galician-Portuguese sar.^[2][3][5][1] The chain shows the Latin /n/ between vowels dropped, first leaving a nasal vowel, and the two vowels then merged into one.^[3][5]

How the short infinitive grew into the present form is explained in two ways: Cunha, Nascentes and Aurélio start from its future sarei, from which speakers drew a new infinitive in -ar.^[3][5][6] Houaiss and Wiktionary see instead the influence of the old verb çarrar (“to close”), today cerrar.^[2][1] It is a doublet of the learned sanar, taken later from the same Latin verb.^[3][1]

The same Latin verb is Spanish sanar, Catalan sanar and Italian sanare, and in many Romance dialects it has come to mean “to castrate”.^[7] The Latin word is formed from sānus (“sound, healthy”).^[8][1]

Earliest recorded meaning

In the oldest texts the verb means “to heal, cure”: the Crónica Troiana speaks of three months spent burying and burning the dead and healing the wounded (saar os chagados), and a satirical cantiga by Gonçal' Eanes do Vinhal says of a sick man that the doctor does not know how to cure him (non sabe que possa saar / o doente).^[4] The Cantigas de Santa Maria use sãar for the healing of lepers (muitos gafos sãou).^[4]

Semantic evolution

Cardoso's dictionary of 1569 renders sarar with Latin sano and sospito, and Pereira (1697) with sanesco “to recover”.^[9][10] Bluteau separates the transitive sense “to give health” from the intransitive “to recover health”, gives sarar hüa chaga “to heal a wound”, and quotes the proverb comer até adoecer, curar até sarar.^[11] Folqman (1755) adds “to mend a broken thing”.^[12] Morais (1789) records the figurative use for correcting habits.^[13]

Today the verb is used of a wound that closes and heals over, and figuratively for removing faults or ills.^[2][14] The DLP and Michaelis also give “to purify”.^[14][15] Schlee records the intransitive and pronominal uses in Rio Grande do Sul.^[16]

Timeline

• 14th century – Houaiss's and Cunha's first records of sarar, beside saar.^[2][3]
• 1496 – sarar in the História de mui nobre Vespasiano.^[17]
• 1569 – Cardoso glosses it with Latin sano.^[9]
• 1697 – Pereira glosses it with Latin sanesco.^[10]
• 1712–1728 – Bluteau distinguishes “to give health” and “to recover health”.^[11]
• 1755 – Folqman adds the sense “to mend a broken thing”.^[12]
• 1789 – Morais records the figurative sarar os costumes “to correct habits”.^[13]
• 1871–1874 – Vieira derives it from Latin sanare.^[18]

Meanings

Verb

1. To heal or cure; to restore someone to health: O xarope sarou-a em três dias.^[2][19][1]
2. (intransitive and pronominal) To recover, get well: Sarou depressa da constipação.^[2][15]
3. (intransitive) Of a wound, to close up and scar over: O corte no joelho já sarou.^[2][14]
4. (figurative) To remove faults or ills; to correct.^[2][19][15]
5. To purify, make clean.^[15][14]

Word family

• sarado

Related words

• sanar

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 Houaiss, Antônio; Villar, Mauro de Salles (2001), Dicionário Houaiss da língua portuguesa, Rio de Janeiro: Objetiva, p. s.v. sarar
3. ^ 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. sarar
4. ^ 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. saar
5. ^ a b c Nascentes, Antenor (1966), Dicionário etimológico resumido, Rio de Janeiro: Instituto Nacional do Livro, p. s.v. sarar
6. ^ Ferreira, Aurélio Buarque de Holanda, Novo dicionário Aurélio da língua portuguesa, digital edition, p. s.v. sarar
7. ^ Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter, p. 7566
8. ^ Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press, p. s.v. sānō
9. ^ a b Cardoso, Jerónimo (1569–1570), Dictionarium ex lusitanico in latinum sermonem, Lisboa: João Álvares (CLP transcription, Universidade de Aveiro), p. s.v. sarar
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. sarar
11. ^ 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. sarar
12. ^ a b Folqman, Carlos (1755), Diccionario portuguez, e latino, Lisboa: Régia Officina Silviana (CLP transcription, Universidade de Aveiro), p. s.v. sarar
13. ^ 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, 377
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. sarar
15. ^ a b c d 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. sarar
16. ^ Schlee, Aldyr Garcia (2019), Dicionário da Cultura Pampeana Sul-Rio-Grandense, 2 vols., Pelotas: Fructos do Paiz, p. s.v. sarar
17. ^ Centro de Linguística da Universidade de Lisboa, CTA – Corpus de Textos Antigos, https://teitok.clul.ul.pt/cta, p. s.v. sarar
18. ^ 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, 411
19. ^ a b 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. sarar