bayo

Forms

bayo (feminine baya, masculine plural bayos, feminine plural bayas)^[1] Old Spanish wrote it vayo more often than bayo;^[2][3][4] Covarrubias in 1611 still noted that it was usually written and pronounced with ⟨v⟩.^[2][3][4]

Etymology

It is inherited from Latin badius (“bay, chestnut-coloured (of horses)”).^[5][6][7][1] The same word is French bai, Occitan bai and Portuguese baio. Italian baio (from the 13th century) came from the French word, and Catalan bai from Castilian.^[5][8] Corominas notes that a preliterary Catalan form baig must have existed, from a charter of 1063.^[5] Wiktionary considers bazo a possible doublet, and García de Diego lists it, in the sense “dark, yellowish”, under the same Latin word.^[1][9]

The Latin adjective is a rare technical word for the colour of horses in Latin, recorded from Varro on.^[10][11] Its only certain cognate is Old Irish buide (“yellow”), from Proto-Celtic *bodyos, and the DLE calls it a word of Celtic origin.^[10][7][1] De Vaan considers a Proto-Indo-European origin unlikely because of the limited distribution and the initial /b/.^[10] Wiktionary suggests a borrowing between Italic and Celtic, perhaps from Gaulish.^[10][1]

Earliest recorded meaning

The first record is in a charter of 944 from the monastery of Oña, and the word is common in the old charters.^[5][6] It is used of horses from the beginning: the 13th-century book on horses speaks of cauallo bayo, and the Gran conquista de Ultramar (c. 1295) of un cavallo bayo grande e fermoso “a big, handsome bay horse”.^[12]

Semantic evolution

The proverb uno piensa el bayo y otro el que lo ensilla “the bay horse thinks one thing and the man who saddles him another” is recorded from the 15th century, and the Academy explained it in 1770 as the different ways of thinking of those who command and those who obey.^[5][13] The shade named has varied: Autoridades in 1726 described it as a pale gold tending to white, Terreros as a colour tending to red, and the Academy in 1884 as yellowish white with a reddish sheen.^[14][15][16]

In 1770 the Academy added a noun sense from Old Castile, the silkworm moth that anglers put on the hook, with the phrase pescar de bayo.^[13] In the Americas the word is recorded from 1545 for horses in Puebla.^[17] Mexico has a series of names for shades of bay horses, such as bayo coyote and bayo lobo, and calls a light-yellow bean bayo.^[18] In rural Chile a bayo was the bier on which the poor were carried to the cemetery, a sense Román derives from bayeta, the black cloth put on coffins.^[19][20][21]

Timeline

• 944 – first record, in a charter of Oña.^[5][6]
• c. 1275 – the book on horses speaks of cauallo bayo.^[12]
• 1330–1343 – the Libro de buen amor writes vayo.^[4]
• 15th century – the proverb uno piensa el bayo y otro el que lo ensilla is recorded.^[5]
• 1545 – first record in the Americas, potro de color bayo in Puebla.^[17]
• 1611 – Covarrubias notes the usual spelling with ⟨v⟩.^[3]
• 1726 – Autoridades defines the colour as a pale gold tending to white.^[14]
• 1770 – the Academy adds the silkworm moth used as bait.^[13]
• 1884 – the Academy first gives an etymology, from Latin badius.^[16]

Meanings

Adjective

1. Of a horse or its coat: of a yellowish-white colour; dun, bay.^[7][1] Also used as a noun for such a horse.^[7][22][1]
2. (Costa Rica, Cuba) Of beans: light yellow.^[23]

Noun

1. The silkworm moth, used by anglers as bait on the hook.^[7][22]
2. (Venezuela) A leaf of the bijao plant used to wrap some foods.^[23]
3. (Chile, rural, dated) A bier for carrying the dead of poor families to the cemetery.^[20][21]

Related words

• bazo
• bayeta
• Latin badius
• Portuguese baio
• French bai

Usage notes

Pescar de bayo means to fish using the silkworm moth as bait.^[7]

References

1. ^ a b c d e f g h 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. bayo
3. ^ a b c Covarrubias Orozco, Sebastián de (1611), Tesoro de la lengua castellana o española, Madrid: Luis Sánchez (Biblioteca Wordkers transcription, CC BY 4.0), p. 269
4. ^ a b c Boggs, R. S.; Kasten, Lloyd; Keniston, Hayward; Richardson, H. B. (1946), Tentative Dictionary of Medieval Spanish, 2 vols., Chapel Hill, N.C., p. s.v. bayo
5. ^ a b c d e f g Corominas, Joan; Pascual, José A. (1980–1991), Diccionario crítico etimológico castellano e hispánico, 6 vols., Madrid: Gredos, p. 1, 549
6. ^ a b c Corominas, Joan (1973), Breve diccionario etimológico de la lengua castellana, 3rd ed., Madrid: Gredos, p. s.v. bayo
7. ^ a b c d e f 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. bayo
8. ^ Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter
9. ^ García de Diego, Vicente (1985), Diccionario etimológico español e hispánico, 2nd ed., Madrid: Espasa-Calpe (1st ed. 1954), p. 871
10. ^ a b c d de Vaan, Michiel (2008), Etymological Dictionary of Latin and the other Italic Languages, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 7, Leiden; Boston: Brill
11. ^ Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press, p. s.v. badius
12. ^ a b 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. 508
13. ^ a b c Real Academia Española (1770), Diccionario de la lengua castellana, 2nd ed., vol. I: A–B, Madrid: Joachín Ibarra, p. 465
14. ^ a b Real Academia Española (1726–1739), Diccionario de la lengua castellana (Diccionario de Autoridades), 6 vols., Madrid: Francisco del Hierro, p. 1, 581
15. ^ Terreros y Pando, Esteban de (1786–1793), Diccionario castellano con las voces de ciencias y artes y sus correspondientes de las tres lenguas francesa, latina e italiana, 4 vols., Madrid: Viuda de Ibarra, p. 1, 232
16. ^ 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. 143
17. ^ a b 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. bayo
18. ^ Santamaría, Francisco J. (1942), Diccionario general de americanismos, 3 vols., México: Pedro Robredo, p. 197
19. ^ Román, Manuel Antonio (1901–1918), Diccionario de chilenismos y de otras voces y locuciones viciosas, 5 vols., Santiago de Chile: Imprenta de San José, p. 144
20. ^ a b Medina, José Toribio (1927), Chilenismos: apuntes lexicográficos, Santiago de Chile: Imprenta Universo, p. 22
21. ^ a b Malaret, Augusto (1946), Diccionario de americanismos, 3rd ed., Buenos Aires: Emecé, p. 142
22. ^ a b Moliner, María (2007), Diccionario de uso del español, 3rd ed., Madrid: Gredos, p. s.v. bayo
23. ^ a b Asociación de Academias de la Lengua Española (2010), Diccionario de americanismos, Lima: Santillana; online at https://www.asale.org/damer, p. s.v. bayo