cavall

Forms

cavall m (plural cavalls)^[1] Old Catalan also wrote caval and cavayl.^[2][3] The DCVB records the pronunciations /kəβáʎ/, /kaβáʎ/, /kəváʎ/ and /kaváʎ/, and also /kavál/ with a plain final /l/.^[4]

Etymology

It is inherited from Latin caballus (“nag, work horse”), a word that sometimes meant a worn-out or working horse and sometimes a gelding, and that began in Vulgar Latin to be used for any horse.^[2][5][6][1] Coromines notes that from the early Middle Ages its descendants replaced equus (“horse”) completely in all the Romance languages, and that an inscription from Hispania of the 1st century AD already uses it without a slighting sense, paired with the feminine equa (“mare”).^[2]

The same Latin word is Italian cavallo, French cheval, Occitan caval, Spanish caballo, Portuguese cavalo and Romanian cal.^[7][1]

The Latin noun, recorded from Lucilius on, was itself a loanword; de Vaan notes that Ancient Greek καβάλλης (kabállēs, “nag”) is too old to come from Latin, and that the ultimate source remains unclear.^[8] Coromines thinks the word reached Latin from Gaul but was not Celtic, the Insular Celtic forms being borrowed from Latin.^[2] Wiktionary calls the origin uncertain, gives the common view that it was borrowed from Gaulish, perhaps ultimately an Asian wanderword, and compares Proto-Slavic *kobýla (“mare”).^[1]

Earliest recorded meaning

Coromines gives as the first record a Barcelona document of 1030 in Latin with the Romance word in it: aut in mul aut in caval “either on a mule or on a horse”; the Latinised form cavallo appears in charters from 951.^[2] In the first Catalan texts the word already means the horse in general, the mount of knights and soldiers.^[2][9]

Semantic evolution

In the chronicles the horse is above all the war horse: Jaume I reckons one horse worth more than twenty Saracens.^[2] Llull explains that a horse is given to a knight as a sign of nobility of courage.^[9] The plural cavalls could stand for horsemen, as in a letter of 1465 about the pay of the horse troops, and Desclot (1283) has the phrase per cames de cavall for riding off on horseback.^[3]

The name passed early to objects shaped like a horse or used like one: an inventory from Perpignan of 1307 lists a wooden horse for keeping saddles on, and a document of 1458 an iron cavall for a roasting spit.^[10] Coromines records it for a sawhorse in Onofre Pou's dictionary, and in the valley of Cardós for the first sheaf laid on a stack and for a kind of beam.^[2] The playing card with a mounted figure appears in the medieval Procés de les olives.^[3]

Its derivatives are among the oldest words of the language: cavaller “knight” is recorded in 1046 and cavalcar “to ride” in 1054.^[5] Fabra's dictionary of 1932 defines the animal by the features that set it apart from the ass and the zebra, a definition the DIEC2 keeps.^[11][12]

Timeline

• 1030 – caval in a Barcelona document in Latin; the Latinised cavallo is older, from 951.^[2]
• 1046 – the derivative cavaller “knight”.^[5]
• 1261–1271 – cavall in the Furs de València, the earliest text in CICA with this spelling.^[13]
• 1290 – Arnau de Vilanova writes both cavayl and caval.^[3]
• 1307 – a wooden caval for saddles in an inventory from Perpignan.^[10]
• 1927 – Pal·las records cavall de batalla and cavall blanc, a person who puts up the money for a doubtful venture.^[14]
• 1932 – Fabra's Diccionari general.^[11]

Meanings

Noun

1. horse, the domestic hoofed mammal (Equus caballus) used for riding, draught and work: Va muntar el cavall negre fins al poble.^[12][6][1]
2. (elliptical) A horseman, a mounted soldier.^[6]
3. A figure representing a horse.^[6][4]
4. (chess) The knight.^[6][1]
5. (card games) The card numbered 11, which shows a mounted figure.^[6][4]
6. A support or trestle, such as a sawhorse.^[6][14]
7. (drug slang) heroin.^[1]
8. cavall de batalla: a seasoned war horse;^[12][15] (figurative) the point someone keeps insisting on in a dispute.^[12]
9. a cavall de: astride;^[12][15] (figurative) between two periods or two places.^[12]

Word family

• cavalcar
• cavalcada
• cavalcadura
• encavalcar
• cavaller
• cavallet
• cavalló
• encavallar
• cavallerís
• cavallerissa
• cavallada

Related words

• Latin caballus
• Spanish caballo
• French cheval

Usage notes

As an interjection cavall! is a euphemism for carall; the DIEC2 heads it as a separate word, and Martí Gadea recorded the Valencian ¡cavall! ¡recavall! in 1891.^[12][15] The proverb tot bon cavall ensopega says that even the most skilful person can make a mistake.^[16]

References

1. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i Coromines, Joan (1980–2001), Diccionari etimològic i complementari de la llengua catalana, 10 vols., Barcelona: Curial / La Caixa (online ed., Institut d'Estudis Catalans 2024), p. 2, 647
3. ^ a b c d Faraudo de Saint-Germain, Lluís, Vocabulari de la llengua catalana medieval, online edition, Barcelona: Institut d'Estudis Catalans, p. s.v. cavall
4. ^ a b c Alcover, Antoni M.; Moll, Francesc de B. (1930–1962), Diccionari català-valencià-balear, 10 vols., Palma de Mallorca: Moll, p. s.v. cavall
5. ^ a b c Bruguera, Jordi (1996), Diccionari etimològic, Barcelona: Enciclopèdia Catalana, p. 194
6. ^ a b c d e f g Enciclopèdia Catalana, Gran diccionari de la llengua catalana (GDLC), Barcelona: Enciclopèdia Catalana; online edition, https://www.diccionari.cat, p. s.v. cavall
7. ^ Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter, p. 1440
8. ^ de Vaan, Michiel (2008), Etymological Dictionary of Latin and the other Italic Languages, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 7, Leiden; Boston: Brill, p. s.v. caballus
9. ^ a b Nou glossari general lul·lià (NGGL), Centre de Documentació Ramon Llull, Universitat de Barcelona, https://nggl.ub.edu, p. s.v. cavall
10. ^ a b Gual Camarena, Miguel, Vocabulario del comercio medieval, online edition, Universidad de Murcia, https://www.um.es/lexico-comercio-medieval, p. s.v. cavall
11. ^ a b Fabra, Pompeu (1932), Diccionari general de la llengua catalana, Barcelona: Llibreria Catalònia, p. s.v. cavall
12. ^ a b c d e f g Institut d'Estudis Catalans (2007), Diccionari de la llengua catalana, 2nd ed. (DIEC2), Barcelona: Edicions 62; online edition with later updates, https://dlc.iec.cat, p. s.v. cavall
13. ^ Torruella, Joan; Pérez Saldanya, Manuel; Martines, Josep (dirs.), Corpus Informatitzat del Català Antic (CICA), https://www.cica.cat, p. s.v. cavall
14. ^ a b Vallès, Emili (1927), Pal·las: diccionari català il·lustrat, Barcelona: Salvat, p. s.v. cavall
15. ^ a b c Martí Gadea, Joaquim (1891), Novísimo diccionario general valenciano-castellano, Valencia, p. s.v. cavall
16. ^ Rodamots: cada dia, un mot (online), https://rodamots.cat, p. s.v. cavall