Los términos de enfermedades en el Livro d’Alveitaria de Mestre Giraldo

Abstract

Our proposal consists in the analysis of the lexicon of horse diseases that appears in the Livro d’alveitaria by Mestre Giraldo. This is a treatise made under the rule of the Portuguese king D. Dinis by one of his physicians, in 1318. As it is told by Mestre Giraldo, this treatise is a compilation of knowledge about veterinary medicine that could be found at that time in the works of Theudoric Borgognoni, Mulomedicina, or Practicaequorum, or De medelaequorum, and of Jurdanus Ruffus, Maniscalcie liber, both of the 13th century.

The analysis we mean to present has as main objective the comparison between the Portuguese lexicon that designates horse diseases and the correspondent Latin lexicon. With this comparison we may understand if the Portuguese terms of veterinary medicine result from an erudite adaptation of the Latin terms, or if they are etymologically or morphologically independent of those. If this second hypothesis is confirmed, we will observe if those terms obey to the Portuguese typical word formation parameters, or if they are dependent on non-Romance cultural traditions, as, for example, on the Arabian influence.

If the terms of horse diseases are constructed in Portuguese, we will describe the derivation mechanisms which are in their origin. In this way, we will point out the word formation processes that are more usual in the construction of these terms, the used affixes and the prototypical meanings constructed by those mechanisms.