Etymologically
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tomato

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Pronunciation

  • IPA: /təˈmɑː.təʊ/ (UK); /təˈmeɪ.toʊ/ (US)[1]

Etymology

It is an alteration of earlier tomate,[2][3][4] borrowed from Spanish tomate (or tomate),[2][3][5] from Classical Nahuatl tomatl (“tomato”),[2][3][5] said to mean the swelling fruit, from tomana (“to swell”).[3] The spelling was probably influenced by potato.[2][3][4]

Earliest recorded meaning

1604 (tomate) in Barnhart, the OED and Merriam-Webster; the form tomato from 1753, in Chambers' Cyclopaedia.[2][6][4][3]

Semantic evolution

Tomato, tomata and tomatum were 18th-century pseudo-Spanish and Latin forms.[5] Introduced to Europe from the New World, tomatoes were eaten in Italy by 1550 but in England were long grown only as ornamental plants;[3] the 1753 Cyclopaedia describes it as eaten by Spaniards, Italians and Jewish families in England.[3] Thomas Jefferson introduced it in the United States in 1789, but it was not commonly eaten there until about 1830.[3] The older English name was love apple.[3] Tomato sauce is by 1806, and the slang sense, an attractive woman, by 1922.[3][6]

Timeline

  • 1604 – tomate.[2][6]
  • 1753 – tomato.[2]
  • 1806 – tomato sauce.[3]
  • 1844 – tomato juice.[3]
  • 1922 – an attractive woman (slang).[3]

Modern meaning

Noun

  1. The red, juicy, fleshy fruit of a South American plant of the nightshade family, eaten raw or cooked as a vegetable.
  2. The plant itself, Lycopersicon esculentum.
  3. (dated slang) An attractive woman.

Word family

  • tomatoey
  • currant tomato
  • husk tomato
  • strawberry tomato
  • beefsteak tomato
  • cherry tomato
  • tomato hornworm
  • plum tomato

Usage notes

The AHD notes that the tomato, like the potato and squash, was domesticated by the peoples of the Americas.[7]

References

  1. ^ Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
  2. ^ a b c d e f g Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
  3. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
  4. ^ a b c Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
  5. ^ a b c Hoad, T. F., ed. (1986), The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology, Oxford: Clarendon Press
  6. ^ a b c Simpson, J. A.; Weiner, E. S. C., eds. (1989), The Oxford English Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Clarendon Press
  7. ^ The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (1992), 3rd ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin