From: Adam Walker (carrajena@yahoo.com)
Date: Sat Jun 07 2003 - 17:09:23 EST
I'm surprised that no one has yet mentioned the
alternate theory that Usted is a borrowing from Arabic
ustez.
ADam
--- Mermaid Productions <info@mermaid-productions.com>
wrote:
> > Could someone enlighten me on the etymology of
> Spanish
> 'Usted'? TIA.
> > James
>
> It comes from the expression 'Vuestra Merced' (or an
> older form
> thereof), which means something along the lines of
> "Your Honor"
> or "your Grace". Hence the use of 3rd person verb
> forms with it.
> Must be an Iberian thing, as Portuguese and Catalan
> also have
> similar second-but-really-third person formal
> pronouns with the
> same origin (voc?and vost?.
>
> Thomas
>
>
>
> ------------------------ Yahoo! Groups Sponsor
>
> To unsubscribe to this group, sell your soul to
> Satan, do not pass go, do not collect $200. In other
> words, you're stuck here now!!
>
>
>
> Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to
> http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/
>
>
This archive was generated by hypermail 2.1.7 : Fri Oct 03 2003 - 12:19:46 EST