arcilla

Forms

arcilla f (plural arcillas)^[1] Old Spanish wrote arziella, arçiella and arzilla.^[2][1] Murcia has arcila and Aragonese arguilla;^[3] argila is a Catalanising or Latinising form.^[4][3]

Etymology

It is inherited from Old Spanish arziella, inherited from Latin argilla (“potter's clay”), which is from Ancient Greek ἄργιλλος (árgillos, “white clay”).^{[4][5][6][1][7]} Corominas notes that the ⟨z⟩ was voiced in Old Spanish, as in Alonso de Palencia.^[4] The same Latin word is Portuguese argila, Catalan argila, French argile and Italian argilla.^[8][3] Coromines explains the Catalan single ⟨l⟩ by a reduction of ⟨ll⟩ after a long vowel in the Vulgar Latin of north-eastern Spain and Gaul.^[9]

The Greek word is usually derived from ἀργός (argós, “shining white”), but Beekes finds the meaning a poor match and the suffix possibly non-Indo-European, and thinks a Pre-Greek substrate word quite possible.^[10][1]

Earliest recorded meaning

Corominas's first record is the glossaries of El Escorial and Toledo of about 1400, but the derivative arcillero is found as early as 1210.^[4][5] The Academy's corpus has arziella in the Libro de los caballos (c. 1275), in a remedy: tomar el arziella del barro más fuerte que fallaren “take the clay of the stiffest mud they can find”, and in Alfonso X's General estoria, which says that wolves eat earth when hungry, e esto es arziella “and this is clay”.^[11][2]

Semantic evolution

Covarrubias (1611) explains it as a kind of earth, Latin argilla, that potters use for their vessels.^[12] Autoridades (1726) calls it a white, sticky earth commonly called greda, and reports Alonso de Palencia's view that the name came from the first vessels having been made of it at Argos, preferring the plain derivation from Latin argilla.^[13] By 1884 the Academy described it chemically, as a combination of silica and alumina that turns plastic when wet and loses this when fired.^[14] The DLE now defines it as a fine earth of hydrated aluminium silicates.^[6]

Timeline

• 1210 – the derivative arcillero.^[4][5]
• c. 1275 – arziella in the Libro de los caballos and in Alfonso X's General estoria.^[11]
• c. 1400 – arzilla glosses Latin lavina in a Latin–Spanish glossary.^[15][4]
• 1492 – Nebrija's Latin dictionary renders argilla as barro o arzilla.^[16]
• 1611 – Covarrubias defines it as potter's earth.^[12]
• 1705 – the derivative arcilloso.^[5]
• 1884 – the Academy's dictionary gives a chemical definition.^[14]

Meanings

Noun

1. clay: a fine-grained earth made of hydrated aluminium silicates, formed by the weathering of aluminium minerals, white when pure and coloured by impurities; it becomes plastic when wet and hard when fired, and is used for pottery: Modeló un jarrón de arcilla roja.^[6][17][1]

Word family

• arcilloso
• arcillero

Related words

• argila
• greda
• Latin argilla

References

1. ^ a b c d e f Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b Diccionario del Español Medieval electrónico (DEMel), data publication 2026 (CC BY-SA), Universität Rostock, p. s.v. arcilla
3. ^ a b c García de Diego, Vicente (1985), Diccionario etimológico español e hispánico, 2nd ed., Madrid: Espasa-Calpe (1st ed. 1954), p. art. 691
4. ^ a b c d e f Corominas, Joan; Pascual, José A. (1980–1991), Diccionario crítico etimológico castellano e hispánico, 6 vols., Madrid: Gredos, p. 1, 317
5. ^ a b c d Corominas, Joan (1973), Breve diccionario etimológico de la lengua castellana, 3rd ed., Madrid: Gredos, p. s.v. arcilla
6. ^ a b c Real Academia Española; Asociación de Academias de la Lengua Española (2014–), Diccionario de la lengua española, 23rd ed., online version 23.8, https://dle.rae.es, p. s.v. arcilla
7. ^ Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
8. ^ Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter, p. 641
9. ^ 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. 1, 382
10. ^ Beekes, Robert S. P. (2010), Etymological Dictionary of Greek, with the assistance of Lucien van Beek, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 10, Leiden; Boston: Brill
11. ^ a b Real Academia Española (2013–), Corpus del Diccionario histórico de la lengua española (CDH), version 3.1, https://apps.rae.es/CNDHE, p. s.v. arcilla
12. ^ a b Covarrubias Orozco, Sebastián de (1611), Tesoro de la lengua castellana o española, Madrid: Luis Sánchez (Biblioteca Wordkers transcription, CC BY 4.0), p. 207
13. ^ Real Academia Española (1726–1739), Diccionario de la lengua castellana (Diccionario de Autoridades), 6 vols., Madrid: Francisco del Hierro, p. 1, 379
14. ^ a b Real Academia Española (1884), Diccionario de la lengua castellana, 12th ed., Madrid: Imprenta de D. Gregorio Hernando (the first Academy edition with etymologies), p. 93
15. ^ Alonso Pedraz, Martín (1986), Diccionario medieval español: desde las Glosas Emilianenses y Silenses (s. X) hasta el siglo XV, 2 vols., Salamanca: Universidad Pontificia de Salamanca, p. 368
16. ^ Lleal, Coloma (dir.), DICCA-XV: Diccionario del castellano del siglo XV en la Corona de Aragón, Barcelona: Universitat de Barcelona, Grup d'Estudis d'Història de la Llengua (GHCL), https://ghcl.ub.edu/diccaxv, p. s.v. arcilla
17. ^ Moliner, María (2007), Diccionario de uso del español, 3rd ed., Madrid: Gredos, p. s.v. arcilla