tudo

Etymology

It is inherited from Latin tōtus (“whole, all”), in the neuter form, through the medieval Old Galician-Portuguese todo, which is also the source of the adjective todo.^[2][3][4][1] Nascentes explains the /u/ as a change made to tell the neuter pronoun apart from the masculine adjective, a view he attributes to Diez.^[4][5] He lists other explanations: Meyer-Lübke put the /u/ down to the final vowel, Carolina Michaëlis to the influence of muito, and Cornel Mota to the need to keep the pronoun apart from the adjective.^[5]

The same Latin word is Galician todo, Spanish todo, Catalan tot, French tout, Italian tutto and Romanian tot.^[6][1] Corominas notes that only Castilian and Portuguese kept the classical form of the word, while most other Romance languages have a form with a doubled consonant.^[7] Everywhere it also took over the sense of omnis (“every, all”).^[7]

The origin of the Latin word is unknown: de Vaan finds none of the proposed etymologies convincing.^[8] Wiktionary mentions a possible link with touto (“people”).^[1]

Earliest recorded meaning

Houaiss and Cunha date the pronoun to the 13th century.^[2][3] Nascentes, on the other hand, calls tudo a recent form: the neuter was still written todo in the early 16th century, as in the Leal Conselheiro (E sem ella todo o que se pensa seer siso “and without it all that is thought to be wisdom”), and tudo appears in documents of 1548 and 1549 and in the Eufrosina.^[5] The CTA corpus has tudo in 1496.^[9]

Semantic evolution

Bluteau defines tudo as all things without exception and gives sobre tudo “above all”.^[10] Morais in 1789 describes it as a form of the adjective todo meaning “all things”, with the phrases he o meu tudo “it is my all” and sobre tudo.^[11] The sense “what is essential, what really counts” and the use for the person most dear to someone are recorded by the modern dictionaries.^[2][12][13]

In informal speech tudo also refers to people, “everyone”.^[2][1] The greeting tudo bem? “how are things?” and its answer tudo bem are recorded by Houaiss.^[2] In colloquial Brazilian Portuguese it is also used before a noun in the sense “every, all”.^[1]

Timeline

• 13th century – first record, according to Houaiss and Cunha.^[2][3]
• 1496 – tudo in the História de mui nobre Vespasiano.^[9]
• 1548–1549 – tudo in documents, at a time when the neuter todo was still in use.^[5]
• 1697 – Pereira glosses tudo with Latin omnis.^[14]
• 1712–1728 – Bluteau gives sobre tudo “above all”.^[10]
• 1789 – Morais records he o meu tudo.^[11]

Meanings

Pronoun

1. everything, all things: Ele sabe tudo sobre carros.^{[2][15][12][1]}
2. All that is in question in a context: Já arrumei tudo na mala.^[2][16][13]
3. (informal) everyone, all the people present or in question.^[2][13][1]
4. What is essential, the thing that really counts: Para ela, a família é tudo.^[2][13][1]
5. (é o meu tudo) The person most dear to someone.^[12][13]
6. (before isto, isso, aquilo, o) All of: tudo isso.^[13]

Determiner

1. (Brazil, colloquial, dialectal) Every, all.^[1]

Word family

• sobretudo

Related words

• todo
• total
• Latin tōtus

Usage notes

Common phrases are tudo bem, a greeting and its answer, mais que tudo “above all”, and em tudo e por tudo “in every way”.^[2][12][17]

Old texts also have an unrelated tudo “held, had”, a variant of teúdo, the old past participle of ter.^[18][19]

References

1. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k Houaiss, Antônio; Villar, Mauro de Salles (2001), Dicionário Houaiss da língua portuguesa, Rio de Janeiro: Objetiva, p. s.v. tudo
3. ^ a b c Cunha, Antônio Geraldo da (2010), Dicionário etimológico da língua portuguesa, 4th ed., Rio de Janeiro: Lexikon, p. s.v. tudo
4. ^ a b Nascentes, Antenor (1966), Dicionário etimológico resumido, Rio de Janeiro: Instituto Nacional do Livro, p. s.v. tudo
5. ^ a b c d Nascentes, Antenor (1955), Dicionário etimológico da língua portuguesa, vol. 1: Nomes comuns, Rio de Janeiro (1st ed. 1932, preface by W. Meyer-Lübke), p. 511
6. ^ Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter, p. 8815
7. ^ a b Corominas, Joan; Pascual, José A. (1980–1991), Diccionario crítico etimológico castellano e hispánico, 6 vols., Madrid: Gredos, p. 5, 528
8. ^ de Vaan, Michiel (2008), Etymological Dictionary of Latin and the other Italic Languages, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 7, Leiden; Boston: Brill
9. ^ a b Centro de Linguística da Universidade de Lisboa, CTA – Corpus de Textos Antigos, https://teitok.clul.ul.pt/cta, p. s.v. tudo
10. ^ 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. tudo
11. ^ 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, 497
12. ^ a b c d Dicionário Priberam da Língua Portuguesa, Lisboa: Priberam Informática, https://dicionario.priberam.org, p. s.v. tudo
13. ^ a b c d e f 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. tudo
14. ^ 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. tudo
15. ^ Ferreira, Aurélio Buarque de Holanda, Novo dicionário Aurélio da língua portuguesa, digital edition, p. s.v. tudo
16. ^ 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. tudo
17. ^ Porto Editora (2013), Grande Dicionário da Língua Portuguesa, Porto: Porto Editora, p. 9247
18. ^ Silva, António de Morais (1813), Diccionario da lingua portugueza, 2nd ed., 2 vols., Lisboa: Typographia Lacerdina, p. 2, 816
19. ^ Viterbo, Joaquim de Santa Rosa de (1798–1799), Elucidario das palavras, termos e frases que em Portugal antiguamente se usárão, 2 vols., Lisboa: Simão Thaddeo Ferreira, p. 2, 392