ballesta

Forms

ballesta f (plural ballestas)^[1] Old Spanish texts write ballesta, vallesta, balesta and bayllesta.^[2][3]

Etymology

It is inherited from Old Spanish ballesta, inherited from Latin ballista (“siege engine for hurling stones”).^[4][5][6][1] The DLE and the BDELC derive the Latin word from Ancient Greek βάλλω (bállō, “to throw”).^[6][5] Wiktionary gives the Greek noun βαλλίστρα (ballístra), which the LSJ records only in Procopius.^[1][7] Coromines notes that βαλλιστής (ballistḗs, “thrower”) is late and rare, and that the Latin word passed in the Middle Ages from the stone-throwing engine to the crossbow.^[8]

The same Latin word is Catalan ballesta, Asturian ballesta, Portuguese besta, Italian balestra and Occitan balesta.^[9][1] The DCECH explains that Vulgar Latin simplified the double ⟨ll⟩ to balista, which gave the Italian word and Old Galician-Portuguese baesta, later the Portuguese one; Old Catalan balesta, frequent until 1442, seems to continue it too.^[4] The learned balista is the same Latin word.^[1]

Earliest recorded meaning

The CDH's first record is in the Fuero de Zorita de los Canes (1218–1250), which speaks of hunting con aues, o con canes, o con redes, o con uallesta “with hawks, dogs, nets or crossbow”;^[3][2] DEMel has balesta in the Fuero de Coria of the early 13th century.^[3][2] The Fueros of Cáceres and Usagre require a crossbowman to bring a balesta with two strings and sixty bolts.^[3] The DHLE's first record of the crossbow is in the Bocados de oro (before 1250), and of the siege engine in the Poridat de las poridades (c. 1250); the DCECH dates the word to the Calila and Alfonso X's chronicle, in the mid-13th century.^[10][4]

Semantic evolution

The DHLE notes that late Roman military writers already used ballista for a machine that shot arrows, which makes it hard to tell the crossbow and the siege engine apart in medieval texts.^[10] The word was most used in the Middle Ages and the Golden Age.^[10] Covarrubias described the crossbow as little used after the invention of gunpowder, kept for hunting, and the Diccionario de Autoridades said it was then used only for sport, shooting clay pellets (bodoques).^[11][12] The phrase a tiro de ballesta “a crossbow-shot away”, found in the Quijote, came to mean “at a fair distance”.^[13][14]

In the thieves' cant recorded by the Academy from 1770, the plural ballestas meant saddlebags.^[15][16] Gaspar y Roig recorded a bird trap made with a donkey's rib, and Alemany in 1917 the leaf spring on which a carriage rests on its axles; both senses are in the DLE.^[17][18][6]

Timeline

• early 13th century – balesta in the Fuero de Coria.^[2]
• 1218–1250 – uallesta in the Fuero de Zorita de los Canes.^[3]
• before 1250 – the crossbow in the Bocados de oro.^[10]
• c. 1250 – the siege engine in the Poridat de las poridades.^[10]
• 13th century – the derivative ballestero “crossbowman”.^[5][4]
• 1375–1410 – first in a glossary.^[10]
• 1513 – first record from the Americas, in Tierra Firme.^[19]
• 1611 – Covarrubias describes both the ancient engine and the hunting crossbow.^[20]
• 1770 – the Academy records the cant sense “saddlebags”.^[15]
• 1917 – Alemany records the sense “carriage spring”.^[18]

Meanings

Noun

1. A crossbow: a portable weapon that shoots arrows or bolts, a bow fixed across a stock with a mechanism to draw and release the string: El cazador tensó la ballesta.^[6][1]
2. An ancient war machine for hurling stones or heavy darts; a ballista.^[6][1]
3. (mechanics) A leaf spring: an arched spring of several steel plates laid one on another, used in vehicle suspension.^[6][1]
4. A trap for catching birds.^[6][21]

Word family

• ballestero
• ballestera
• desballestar
• emballestarse
• aballestar

Related words

• balista
• balística
• Latin ballista
• Portuguese besta

References

1. ^ a b c d e f g h i Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d Diccionario del Español Medieval electrónico (DEMel), data publication 2026 (CC BY-SA), Universität Rostock, p. s.v. ballesta
3. ^ a b c d e Real Academia Española (2013–), Corpus del Diccionario histórico de la lengua española (CDH), version 3.1, https://apps.rae.es/CNDHE
4. ^ a b c d Corominas, Joan; Pascual, José A. (1980–1991), Diccionario crítico etimológico castellano e hispánico, 6 vols., Madrid: Gredos, p. 1, 482
5. ^ a b c Corominas, Joan (1973), Breve diccionario etimológico de la lengua castellana, 3rd ed., Madrid: Gredos, p. s.v. ballesta
6. ^ a b c d e f g 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. ballesta
7. ^ Liddell, Henry George; Scott, Robert; Jones, Henry Stuart (1940), A Greek-English Lexicon, 9th ed., Oxford: Clarendon Press
8. ^ 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, 603
9. ^ Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter, p. 911
10. ^ a b c d e f Real Academia Española (2013–), Diccionario histórico de la lengua española (DHLE), https://www.rae.es/dhle, p. s.v. ballesta
11. ^ Covarrubias Orozco, Sebastián de (1611), Tesoro de la lengua castellana o española, Madrid: Luis Sánchez (Biblioteca Wordkers transcription, CC BY 4.0), p. 1368
12. ^ Real Academia Española (1726–1739), Diccionario de la lengua castellana (Diccionario de Autoridades), 6 vols., Madrid: Francisco del Hierro, p. 1, 537
13. ^ Cejador y Frauca, Julio (1905–1906), La lengua de Cervantes: gramática y diccionario de la lengua castellana en El ingenioso hidalgo don Quijote de la Mancha, 2 vols., Madrid: Jaime Ratés, p. 161
14. ^ Real Academia Española (1843), Diccionario de la lengua castellana, 9th ed., Madrid: Imprenta de D. Francisco María Fernández, p. 89
15. ^ a b Real Academia Española (1770), Diccionario de la lengua castellana, 2nd ed., vol. I: A–B, Madrid: Joachín Ibarra, p. 1, 431
16. ^ Real Academia Española (1869), Diccionario de la lengua castellana, 11th ed., Madrid: Imprenta de Don Manuel Rivadeneyra, p. 95
17. ^ Gaspar y Roig (eds.) (1853–1855), Biblioteca ilustrada de Gaspar y Roig: Diccionario enciclopédico de la lengua española, 2 vols., Madrid: Imprenta y Librería de Gaspar y Roig, p. 1, 313
18. ^ a b Alemany y Bolufer, José (1917), Diccionario de la lengua española, Barcelona: Ramón Sopena, p. 219
19. ^ Boyd-Bowman, Peter (2003), Léxico hispanoamericano 1493–1993, ed. Ray Harris-Northall and John J. Nitti, New York: Hispanic Seminary of Medieval Studies, p. s.v. balestra
20. ^ Covarrubias Orozco, Sebastián de (1611), Tesoro de la lengua castellana o española, Madrid: Luis Sánchez (Biblioteca Wordkers transcription, CC BY 4.0), p. 272
21. ^ Moliner, María (2007), Diccionario de uso del español, 3rd ed., Madrid: Gredos, p. s.v. ballesta