sobre

Forms

Houaiss records sobre and subre in the 13th century.^[2] Before the article the medieval language also had sobe-lo, with /ɾl/ assimilated to /l/, beside the remade sobre-lo.^[3]

Etymology

It is inherited from Latin super (“over, above, beyond”), written Old Galician-Portuguese sobre in the oldest texts.^[2][4][1]

The same Latin word is Galician sobre, Spanish sobre, Catalan sobre, French sur, Italian sopra and Romanian spre.^[5][6][1]

De Vaan derives the Latin word from Proto-Italic *super and Proto-Indo-European *(h₁)uper(i) (“over, above”);^[7][1] Wiktionary explains it as *eḱs (“out of”) with *uperi.^[7][1] Its cognates include Ancient Greek ὑπέρ (hupér) and the English word over.^[1]

Earliest recorded meaning

Houaiss and Cunha date it to the 13th century, Houaiss from the slips of Cunha's medieval index.^[2][4] The Crónica Troiana has it in the local sense, sija sobre hun cauallo “he sits on a horse”, and in the sense “more than”: ualent sobre quantos ẽno mundo forõ “brave beyond all who ever lived”.^[8]

Semantic evolution

The cantigas d'amigo also use it for “because of”.^[8] Barbosa (1611) and Pereira (1697) gloss it with Latin super and supra.^[9][10] Bluteau (1712–1728) defines it as the preposition of position above.^[11] Silva Bastos (1912) lists “on top of”, “against”, “towards”, “as a consequence of” and “among”.^[12] Houaiss's modern senses run from place (“on, above”) and approximate time or quantity (“about, around”) to the abstract: subject matter (“about, concerning”), dominance, preference and a tax levied on something.^[2]

Timeline

• 13th century – sobre and subre.^[2]
• c. 1400 – sobre in the Santiago fragment of the Flos Sanctorum, its first text in the CTA corpus.^[13]
• 1611 – Barbosa glosses it with Latin super.^[9]
• 1712–1728 – Bluteau calls it the preposition of position above.^[11]

Meanings

Preposition

1. on, on top of: Deixou as chaves sobre a mesa.^[2][1]
2. over, above, at a height over: Um helicóptero voava sobre a cidade.^[2][1]
3. about, concerning: um livro sobre a história do Brasil.^[2][1]
4. About, around (a time or quantity): sobre a meia-noite.^[2]
5. Towards, against: O exército marchou sobre a capital.^[2][12]
6. After, upon, one after another: erro sobre erro.^[2]
7. Marks dominance or influence: ter poder sobre alguém.^[2]
8. Above, in preference to: a amizade sobre o dinheiro.^[2]
9. Levied on: o imposto sobre o tabaco.^[2]

Related words

• sobejo
• soberano
• soberbo
• sobrar
• sobre-
• super
• super-

Usage notes

Houaiss also has two minor nouns sobre /ô/: a nautical shortening of sobrejoanete, and an informal word for a bird's rump, a euphemistic shortening of sobrecu.^[2]

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 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. sobre
3. ^ 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. sobre
4. ^ a b Cunha, Antônio Geraldo da (2010), Dicionário etimológico da língua portuguesa, 4th ed., Rio de Janeiro: Lexikon, p. s.v. sobre
5. ^ Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter
6. ^ García de Diego, Vicente (1985), Diccionario etimológico español e hispánico, 2nd ed., Madrid: Espasa-Calpe (1st ed. 1954)
7. ^ a b de Vaan, Michiel (2008), Etymological Dictionary of Latin and the other Italic Languages, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 7, Leiden; Boston: Brill
8. ^ a b 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. sobre
9. ^ a b Barbosa, Agostinho (1611), Dictionarium lusitanicolatinum, Braga: Fructuoso Lourenço de Basto (CLP transcription, Universidade de Aveiro), p. s.v. sobre
10. ^ 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. sobre
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. sobre
12. ^ a b Silva Bastos, José Timóteo da (1912), Diccionario etymologico, prosodico e orthographico da lingua portugueza, Lisboa: Parceria António Maria Pereira, p. s.v. sobre
13. ^ Centro de Linguística da Universidade de Lisboa, CTA – Corpus de Textos Antigos, https://teitok.clul.ul.pt/cta, p. s.v. sobre