¿Hiedra o yedra?
To paraphrase a song: I say hiedra do you say 'Yedra'?
I was going to do a sentence on the word of the day as there is a sad but beautiful song, written by Violeta Parra and sung stunningly by Mercedes Sosa and Milton Nascimento which I love and which has a chorus involving 'hiedra and piedra' However, I see the thread spells the word with y.
Is it a regional difference or is there an actual difference in meanings?
Here is a link to the amazing song [with words]
6 Answers
As I commented on the daily thread, hiedra is always what I have used, yedra seems to be the less common spelling variant. I can find nothing that tells me where which spelling is used.
Interesting comment from Gekkosan (Venezuelan transplant to Puerto Rico):
http://www.spanishdict.com/answers/171628/ivy-hiedra-or-yedra
Gekkosan
I have never seen "yedra"; looks horrible to me.
• Jan 2, 2011
Other sources:
http://gramatica.celeberrima.com/como-se-escribe-hiedra-o-yedra/
Cómo se escribe hiedra o yedra
Ambas son correctas. Son palabras heterógrafas, es decir, se escribe de diferente manera pero tienen el mismo significado.
Hiedra o yedra es una planta trepadora, la raíces que brotan de sus ramas le sirven para agarrarse de los cuerpos cercanos.
http://es.thefreedictionary.com/yedra
yedra [también hiedra, más usado]
Cuidados de la planta Hedera, Yedra o Hiedra
Su nombre científico es Hedera. Su nombre vulgar es Hiedra. Las especies más comunes son: Hedera canariensis, Hedera helix, Hedera colchica, Hedera nepalensis; además existen numerosas variedades de las tres especies.
Real academia:
hiedra
Tb. yedra.
Del lat. hed?ra.
- f. Planta trepadora, siempre verde, de la familia de las araliáceas, con tronco y ramos sarmentosos, de los que brotan raíces adventicias que se agarran fuertemente a los cuerpos inmediatos, hojas coriáceas, verdinegras, lustrosas, persistentes, pecioladas, partidas en cinco lóbulos, enteras y en forma de corazón las de los ramos superiores, flores de color amarillo verdoso, en umbelas, y fruto en bayas negruzcas del tamaño de un guisante. Aunque no es una parásita verdadera, daña y aun ahoga con su espeso follaje a los árboles por los que trepa.
hiedra arbórea
- f. hiedra.
hiedra terrestre
f. Planta vivaz de la familia de las labiadas, con tallos duros, de 30 a 40 cm, hojas pecioladas en forma de corazón, festoneadas y verdinegras, flores axilares en grupillos separados, de corola azul, fruto en varias semillas menudas. Se ha empleado en medicina como expectorante.
As an add-on, around here we have hierba or hierba buena, but many bars spell it yerba, an older version, I think.
Both are correct, according to the dictionary. In my experience, i would use hiedra, is The one that I use and and hear most of the time.
This is the first time I have seen "yedra." It's sort of like Hierba vs. Yerba. Güero vs.Hüero.
I did ask this question to Rac1 on her Word of the Day yesterday: at my Spanish class, I learned that ivy was 'hiedra'. When I saw that the picture of the day was 'yedra', I assumed that someone didn't know how to spell the word and just decided to sound it out.
Also, it exist the word "hierba", that one means grass
