menester

• mester

Inherited from Latin ministerium. Short form mester via Vulgar Latin *misterium (compare French métier).

• IPA^(key): (Central, Balearic) [mə.nəsˈte]
• IPA^(key): (Valencia) [me.nesˈteɾ]

menester m (plural menesters)

1. office, occupation

   Synonyms: ofici, ocupació

2. necessity, duty

   ser menester (de/que …) ― to be necessary

   és menester (d')anar ― it's necessary to go

   és menester que mengis ― it's necessary that you eat

• haver de menester (“to need”)

• “menester” in Diccionari català-valencià-balear, Antoni Maria Alcover and Francesc de Borja Moll, 1962.
• “menester”, in Gran Diccionari de la Llengua Catalana, Grup Enciclopèdia Catalana, 2024
• “menester” in Diccionari de la llengua catalana, segona edició, Institut d’Estudis Catalans.

Inherited from Old Spanish menester, mester, inherited from Latin ministerium, with an irregular loss of the expected final -o. Coromines and Pascual explain this loss as due to being commonly found in the phrase es menester que, triggering syncope between -ter(o) and que, also arguing against the possibility of an Occitan borrowing due to the word being of "popular" semantics and being found early and in all kinds of texts. Doublet of ministerio.

• IPA^(key): /menesˈteɾ/ [me.nesˈt̪eɾ]
• Rhymes: -eɾ
• Syllabification: me‧nes‧ter

menester m (plural menesteres)

1. something necessary, requirement, must

   Es menester que actuemos con prontitud.

   It is necessary for us to act swiftly.

   Era menester apaciguarlos.

   Appeasing them was a must.

   • 1915, Julio Vicuña Cifuentes, Mitos y Supersticiones Recogidos de la Tradición Oral Chilena, page 54:

     Afligióse ésta, porque no tenía dinero, pero el Duende vino en su auxilio, y hablándole desde el techo, en presencia del magistrado, le dijo: «Ahí tienes, María, para que pagues la multa», y dejó caer sobre sus faldas el dinero que habían menester.

     (please add an English translation of this quotation)

2. (in the plural) duty

   los menesteres del hogar ― household duties

• Joan Coromines, José A[ntonio] Pascual (1985) “menester”, in Diccionario crítico etimológico castellano e hispánico [Critic Castilian and Hispanic Etymological Dictionary] (in Spanish), volume IV (Me–Re), Madrid: Gredos, →ISBN, page 37
• “menester”, in Diccionario de la lengua española [Dictionary of the Spanish Language] (in Spanish), online version 23.7, Royal Spanish Academy [Spanish: Real Academia Española], 2023 November 28