vir

Forms

vir (first-person singular present venho, first-person singular preterite vim, past participle vindo)^[1] Houaiss lists viir and vinir in the 12th century, uijr, veer and venir in the 13th, vyr in 1393 and vir from the 14th–15th century.^[2] Cunha records uijr and viinr in the 13th century.^[3] The cantigas d'amigo conjugate it with vẽo or veo “he came”, veestes, the subjunctive veesse, the future verrei and the conditional verria.^[4]

Etymology

It is inherited from Latin veniō (“to come”), through the old Old Galician-Portuguese viir, also written ⟨vĩir⟩.^[2][3][5][1] The old forms show the loss of the Latin /n/ between vowels, with the tilde of ⟨vĩir⟩ in its place.^[6][7]

The same Latin verb is Spanish venir, Catalan venir, French venir, Italian venire and Romanian veni.^[8][1] The REW notes that the verb sometimes forms a passive in Portuguese.^[8]

The Latin verb goes back to *gʷəniō and the zero grade of Proto-Indo-European *gʷem- (“to come, go”); its cognates include βαίνω (baínō), गच्छति (gácchati) and cuman, the source of English come.^[1][9]

Earliest recorded meaning

Houaiss's earliest date, 1101, is the form uen in a Latin charter.^[2] In the 13th-century cantigas the verb has its present senses: in a cantiga d'escarnho of Afonso X some veen a contas, come to a reckoning, and Pero da Ponte calls a thing of no importance cousa que non vai nen ven, a thing that neither goes nor comes.^[4] Gil Perez Conde fears that he and another will viir a mais, come to blows.^[4]

Semantic evolution

The cantigas also use it for “to happen, befall”.^[10] Feijó (1734) calls the verb irregular and blames the common people for saying venhaes embora for vinde embora.^[11] Bluteau gives vir ao socorro “to come to help” and vir de longe “to come from far”.^[12] Derived nouns are vinda “coming”, from the 13th century as viĩda, and porvir “future”, from the 16th.^[3]

The verb serves as an auxiliary: with a gerund it marks an action that has been going on, and with a and an infinitive one that ends up happening.^[1][2] Colloquially vir com is to come out with complaints, and the slang sense “to reach orgasm” is probably a semantic loan from English come.^[1]

Timeline

• 1101 – a Latin charter has the form uen.^[2]
• 12th century – the forms viir and vinir.^[2]
• 13th century – uijr and viinr; the cantigas d'amigo and d'escarnho use the verb.^[3][4]
• 1393 – the spelling vyr.^[2]
• 1431 – the Vida do honrado Infante Josafat uses vir.^[13]
• 16th century – first record of porvir.^[3]
• 1569 – Cardoso translates it by Latin venio.^[14]
• 1734 – Feijó sets out its irregular present venho, vens, vem.^[11]

Meanings

Verb

1. To come, to move or be brought towards the place where the speaker is: Ela vem cá amanhã.^[2][7][1]
2. To be moving along a way towards a place: lá vem o autocarro.^[2]
3. To arrive; to come and stay for a time.^[2][15][1]
4. To reach as far as (a point or length): A água vinha até aos joelhos.^[2]
5. To appear, attend: O médico vem às dez.^[2][16]
6. To come from; to provir from (a place): Este café vem do Brasil.^[2][7][1]
7. To come back, return.^[2][17][1]
8. To result or derive from; to have its origin in.^[2][15][1]
9. To be about to come, to be near.^[2]
10. To come about, happen, arise; to well up (tears, water).^[2][15][1]
11. To come to mind.^[2][17]
12. (auxiliary) With a gerund, to have been doing; with a and an infinitive, to end up doing.^[1]
13. (colloquial, with com) To come out with, to complain.^[1]

Word family

• porvir
• vinda

Related words

• advir
• convir
• provir
• Latin veniō
• Spanish venir

Usage notes

The same spelling is the future subjunctive of ver “to see” (quando o vir).^[18][19] Cardoso's dictionary of 1562 has vir as a Latin word, “husband”, not the Portuguese verb.^[20]

References

1. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r Houaiss, Antônio; Villar, Mauro de Salles (2001), Dicionário Houaiss da língua portuguesa, Rio de Janeiro: Objetiva, p. s.v. vir
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. vir
4. ^ 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. viir
5. ^ Nascentes, Antenor (1966), Dicionário etimológico resumido, Rio de Janeiro: Instituto Nacional do Livro, p. s.v. vir
6. ^ Nascentes, Antenor (1955), Dicionário etimológico da língua portuguesa, vol. 1: Nomes comuns, Rio de Janeiro (1st ed. 1932, preface by W. Meyer-Lübke), p. 527
7. ^ a b c Ferreira, Aurélio Buarque de Holanda, Novo dicionário Aurélio da língua portuguesa, digital edition, p. s.v. vir
8. ^ a b Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter, p. s.v. venire
9. ^ Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press, p. s.v. venio
10. ^ 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. viir
11. ^ a b Feijó, João de Morais Madureira (1734), Orthographia, ou Arte de escrever, e pronunciar com acerto a lingua portugueza, Lisboa (CLP transcription, Universidade de Aveiro), p. s.v. vir
12. ^ Bluteau, Raphael (1712–1728), Vocabulario portuguez e latino, 8 vols. + 2 supplement vols., Coimbra / Lisboa (CLP transcription, Universidade de Aveiro), p. s.v. vir
13. ^ Centro de Linguística da Universidade de Lisboa, CTA – Corpus de Textos Antigos, https://teitok.clul.ul.pt/cta, p. s.v. vir
14. ^ Cardoso, Jerónimo (1569–1570), Dictionarium ex lusitanico in latinum sermonem, Lisboa: João Álvares (CLP transcription, Universidade de Aveiro), p. s.v. vir
15. ^ a b c Dicionário Priberam da Língua Portuguesa, Lisboa: Priberam Informática, https://dicionario.priberam.org, p. s.v. vir
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. vir
17. ^ a b Porto Editora (2013), Grande Dicionário da Língua Portuguesa, Porto: Porto Editora, p. 9526
18. ^ Wikcionário (Portuguese Wiktionary), pt.wiktionary.org, p. s.v. vir
19. ^ Williams, Edwin B. (1938), From Latin to Portuguese: Historical Phonology and Morphology of the Portuguese Language, Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, p. 202
20. ^ Cardoso, Jerónimo (1562), Dictionarium juventuti studiosae admodum frugiferum, Coimbra: João Álvares (CLP transcription, Universidade de Aveiro), p. s.v. vir