coco

Etymology

It is borrowed from Spanish coco, also borrowed from Portuguese coco,^{[2][3][4][5][6]} the Portuguese word meaning "grinning face, grimace", or according to MWU "bogeyman",^[7][4][3][8] because the three hollows at the base of the shell look like a monkey's or a human face.^{[2][5][9][10]} MWU and Webster's Third take the Portuguese word as probably a baby-talk reduplication of a cry like "boo!".^[3][11] The OED gives a more complex history: the English word came partly from Medieval Latin coccus (“coconut”), a Latinized form, partly from Dutch coquos (now kokos), and probably partly from Spanish, Italian and Portuguese; the Italian word is coco (1514, now cocco), and the Portuguese one is recorded from 1553 and as the plural coquos in 1498, in Vasco da Gama's “Roteiro”.^[12] The earliest English forms were cocus, from 1555, and cocos, from 1579; the form coco itself appears in 1582.^[7][2][5] Webster's New World and Partridge instead derive it from Latin coccum (“a seed, kernel”) and Ancient Greek κόκκος (kókkos, “a berry, grain”).^[13][14]

Earliest recorded meaning

The coconut, and the palm that bears it: 1555, in Eden's translation of Peter Martyr's Decades, at first in Latinized forms.^[12][3][7]

Semantic evolution

The nut itself is now usually called a coconut, a compound first recorded in 1613;^[9][7] before that it had been known as the Indian nut.^[9] Coco survives mostly for the palm and in compounds such as coco palm and coco matting.^[5][4][3] The spelling cocoa for this word goes back to Johnson's Dictionary of 1755, which put the coconut and the cacao under one entry;^{[12][5][4][7]} the OED says this confusion was reflected in, and spread by, Johnson.^[12] The spelling coker was used in the port of London to avoid the ambiguity.^[12][5] From 1828 coco was also slang for the head,^[12][15] and in the southern United States it is a name for nut grass (1874).^[12][3] A separate word coco, the taro root of the West Indies, recorded from about 1740, is of uncertain origin, perhaps from a West African language.^[12][4]

Timeline

• 1555 – the coconut, and the coconut palm, as Latinized cocus.^[12][7]
• 1579 – the form cocos.^[7]
• 1582 – the form coco.^[7]
• 1613 – the compound coconut.^[7][9]
• 1755 – Johnson's Dictionary merges the word with cocoa.^[12][5]
• 1828 – slang, the head.^[12]
• 1874 – in the southern US, nut grass.^[12]

Meanings

Noun

1. The coconut palm.^{[3][8][12][10]}
2. A coconut.^[3][8][12]
3. (slang) The head.^[3][12][15]
4. (chiefly southern US) Nut grass.^[3][12]

Adjective

1. Made from the fibre of the coconut husk: coco matting.^[3][13]

Word family

• coconut
• cocomat
• coco plum

Related words

• coco-de-mer
• cocoa
• cacao
• coir

References

1. ^ a b Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
3. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
4. ^ a b c d e Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
5. ^ a b c d e f g Hoad, T. F., ed. (1986), The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology, Oxford: Clarendon Press
6. ^ Stevenson, Angus, ed. (2010), Oxford Dictionary of English, 3rd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
7. ^ a b c d e f g h i Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
8. ^ a b c Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins
9. ^ a b c d Ayto, John (2005), Word Origins: The Secret Histories of English Words from A to Z, 2nd ed., London: A & C Black
10. ^ a b The Chambers Dictionary (2014), 13th ed., Edinburgh: Chambers
11. ^ Gove, Philip Babcock, ed. (1961), Webster's Third New International Dictionary of the English Language, Unabridged, Springfield, Mass.: G. & C. Merriam
12. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
13. ^ a b Webster's New World College Dictionary (2014), 5th ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
14. ^ Partridge, Eric (1966), Origins: A Short Etymological Dictionary of Modern English, 4th ed., London: Routledge & Kegan Paul
15. ^ a b Green, Jonathon (2010), Green's Dictionary of Slang, London: Chambers; digital ed. 2016–, https://greensdictofslang.com