tu

Etymology

It is inherited from Latin tū (“you”), written Old Galician-Portuguese tu in the oldest texts.^[2][3][1] The same Latin word is Galician ti, Spanish tú, Catalan tu, French tu, Italian tu and Romanian tu.^[4][1][5]

The Latin pronoun goes back to *tū, from *túh₂.^[1] De Vaan lists the Oscan and Umbrian forms of the pronoun beside it; the OLD compares the English word thou.^[6][7]

Earliest recorded meaning

The pronoun is recorded from the 13th century: a Cantiga de Santa Maria has non es tu o que dizias / que mi mais que al amavas “aren't you the one who said you loved me more than anything?”, and Afonso X writes beeito seias tu “blessed be you”.^[8][3] In the cantigas de amor the respectful address is always vos;^[8] tu is used by lords to their minstrel or messenger.^[8]

Semantic evolution

Bluteau (1712) says tu is used to people of low rank, to inferiors and to very close friends, and quotes the proverb A tu por tu, como em taverna “thee for thee, as in a tavern”.^[9] Morais (1789) lists the same intimate uses and adds that in solemn style it is said to God and to kings.^[10] Silva Bastos (1912) records the noun o tu “the use of tu”.^[11]

In Portugal tu remains the ordinary familiar pronoun; in Brazil você has largely replaced it, and tu is literary, archaic or regional there.^[12][1] Colloquial Brazilian Portuguese also uses it after prepositions, a usage the grammars condemn.^[1] The verb tutear “to address as tu”, adapted from French tutoyer, is recorded from 1881;^[3][4] Portuguese also has atuar.^[3][4]

Timeline

• 13th century – tu in the Cantigas de Santa Maria.^[8][2]
• c. 1400 – tu in the Compostela fragment of the Flos Sanctorum (witness 1380–1425).^[13]
• 1611 – Barbosa gives Tu mesmo as Latin tu ipse.^[14]
• 1712 – Bluteau describes tu as used to inferiors and close friends.^[9]
• 1789 – Morais notes its use to God and kings in solemn style.^[10]
• 1881 – first record of tutear.^[3]

Meanings

Pronoun

1. you, thou: the second person singular, as subject, used to someone close or familiar (common in Portugal, literary or regional in Brazil): Tu vens connosco?^{[2][15][1][12]}
2. As a predicate: O culpado és tu.^[2][15]
3. (literary) Used in elevated style to God, a saint or a personified thing.^[12][10]
4. (Brazil, colloquial) After a preposition, instead of ti.^[1]

Noun

1. The familiar address with tu: tratar por tu.^[16][11]

Word family

• tutear

Related words

• te
• ti
• contigo
• teu
• Latin tū
• Spanish tú

Usage notes

Tu cá, tu lá describes great familiarity between two people.^[17][16] In southern Portugal people of the same age and cousins of one generation address each other as tu.^[18]

Houaiss and Michaelis record a separate word tu, an adjective and noun meaning “Bantu”, first listed by Figueiredo in 1899; it is African, since in Bantu ba- is the plural prefix, so that Ba-tu corresponds to os tus.^[2][16] Wiktionary and Wikcionário also give an onomatopoeic interjection tu for the tone of a telephone line after the other party hangs up.^[1][19]

References

1. ^ a b c d e f g h i Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e Houaiss, Antônio; Villar, Mauro de Salles (2001), Dicionário Houaiss da língua portuguesa, Rio de Janeiro: Objetiva, p. s.v. tu
3. ^ a b c d e Cunha, Antônio Geraldo da (2010), Dicionário etimológico da língua portuguesa, 4th ed., Rio de Janeiro: Lexikon, p. s.v. tu
4. ^ a b c Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter, p. 8963
5. ^ Corominas, Joan; Pascual, José A. (1980–1991), Diccionario crítico etimológico castellano e hispánico, 6 vols., Madrid: Gredos, p. 5, 681
6. ^ de Vaan, Michiel (2008), Etymological Dictionary of Latin and the other Italic Languages, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 7, Leiden; Boston: Brill, p. s.v. tū
7. ^ Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press, p. s.v. tū
8. ^ a b c d 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. tu
9. ^ 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. tu
10. ^ a b c 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, 497
11. ^ a b Silva Bastos, José Timóteo da (1912), Diccionario etymologico, prosodico e orthographico da lingua portugueza, Lisboa: Parceria António Maria Pereira, p. s.v. tu
12. ^ a b c Ferreira, Aurélio Buarque de Holanda, Novo dicionário Aurélio da língua portuguesa, digital edition, p. s.v. tu
13. ^ Centro de Linguística da Universidade de Lisboa, CTA – Corpus de Textos Antigos, https://teitok.clul.ul.pt/cta, p. s.v. tu
14. ^ Barbosa, Agostinho (1611), Dictionarium lusitanicolatinum, Braga: Fructuoso Lourenço de Basto (CLP transcription, Universidade de Aveiro), p. s.v. tu
15. ^ a b 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. tu
16. ^ a b c 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. tu
17. ^ Porto Editora (2013), Grande Dicionário da Língua Portuguesa, Porto: Porto Editora, p. 9242
18. ^ 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. tu
19. ^ Wikcionário (Portuguese Wiktionary), pt.wiktionary.org, p. s.v. tu