ahora
Basque
Pronunciation
Audio: (file)
Noun
ahora
Spanish
Alternative forms
- agora (obsolete or dialectal)
Etymology
Inherited from Old Spanish agora, from Latin hāc hōrā (“at this time”).
According to Coromines and Pascual, the original form agora was, from the early modern period, increasingly left to both high and low registers, in favour of the phonetically reduced ahora. Francisco de Quevedo in the early 17th century mocks agora in his Cuento de Cuentos as a "rustic vulgarity", although the term continued to be used by archaizing poets into the 19th century, and it continues to survive to this day in various non-prestigious dialects. As for ahora, there is a very rare early attestation (spelled aora) in Juan Ruiz in the early 14th century, but the term doesn't enter common written usage until the 16th century with writers like Cervantes and Góngora, side-by-side the older agora. Compare Portuguese agora.
Pronunciation
Adverb
ahora
- now (at the present time)
- just now, just a moment ago (in the past)
- very soon, in a moment (in the future)
- (usually preceded by de) of nowadays, of today, latter-day
- Synonym: hoy
- La juventud de ahora entiende esto y más.
- Today's youth understands this and more.
- (Latin America) today
- Synonyms: hoy, hoy en día
- Ahora me levanté temprano y con ánimo.
- Today I woke up early and full of energy.
- Te veré ahora en la noche.
- I'll see you later today in the evening.
- however, on the other hand
- Synonym: sin embargo
- Te quiero mucho. Ahora eso no quiere decir que haré lo que digas.
- I love you. However, that doesn't mean I'll do what(ever) you say.
- (correlative, literary) sometimes...other times
- Ahora dice una cosa, ahora dice lo contrario.
- She sometimes says one thing, and then other times she says the opposite.
Derived terms
Conjunction
ahora ... ahora ...
- (correlative, literary) now...now, whether...or...
- Synonym: ora ... ora ...
- Ahora en la sala, ahora en el comedor, había un desastre por doquier.
- Whether you looked at the kitchen, or the dining room, there was a disaster everywhere.
Further reading
- Joan Coromines, José A[ntonio] Pascual (1984) “hora”, in Diccionario crítico etimológico castellano e hispánico [Critic Castilian and Hispanic Etymological Dictionary] (in Spanish), volume III (G–Ma), Madrid: Gredos, →ISBN, pages 387-388
- “ahora”, in Diccionario de la lengua española [Dictionary of the Spanish Language] (in Spanish), 23rd edition, Royal Spanish Academy, 2014 October 16
- Basque terms with audio pronunciation
- Basque non-lemma forms
- Basque noun forms
- Spanish terms inherited from Old Spanish
- Spanish terms derived from Old Spanish
- Spanish terms derived from Latin
- Spanish 3-syllable words
- Spanish terms with IPA pronunciation
- Spanish terms with audio pronunciation
- Rhymes:Spanish/oɾa
- Rhymes:Spanish/oɾa/3 syllables
- Spanish lemmas
- Spanish adverbs
- Spanish terms with usage examples
- Latin American Spanish
- Spanish literary terms
- Spanish conjunctions
- es:Time