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botón

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Etymology and origin of the Spanish word botón

Confidence
Established
Formation
Borrowing
First attested
1258 More words from the 13th century
Borrowed from
Old French boton via Old Spanish
Ultimate origin
Old French boter

Pronunciation

  • /boˈton/, [boˈt̪õn][1]

Forms

botón m (plural botones)[1]

Etymology

It is inherited from Old Spanish boton, borrowed from Old French boton (“bud; button”) (modern French bouton), which Corominas thinks came in through Old Gascon, where the word had the same form.[2][3][4][1] The Old French noun is a derivative of boter in its sense “to sprout”, the verb that is Spanish botar.[2][4][5] Corominas also allows that the derivative may have been formed in Germanic and taken ready-made from Frankish, comparing Dutch bot (“bud”) and Old Norse bútr (“lump, block of wood”).[2] Wiktionary's French entry derives the French noun from Frankish *bautō (“bump, knob”).[1]

The French word also gave Portuguese botão, Italian bottone and English button.[1][6] Its first sense was the bud of a plant, and the button of clothing is named after it for its shape.[7][8] The Academy's dictionary derived the word from boto in 1884 and 1899, and its 2001 edition from the Spanish verb named above.[9][10][11]

Earliest recorded meaning

Spanish records the button of clothing first, in 1258; the plant sense is not recorded before Nebrija.[2][3] About 1295 the Gran conquista de Ultramar compares two round rings to buttons of gold: dos sortijas redondas, fechas como botones de oro.[12]

Semantic evolution

Nebrija (c. 1495) gives the button of clothing, the cautery botón de fuego and the bud of a tree.[13] Covarrubias (1611) calls the word French and explains the button by its likeness to the bud of the vine.[14] Autoridades adds the knob for pulling a door, a ring-shaped moulding on balusters and keys, the unopened flower, the button on a fencing sword, and a pimple, a sense it calls rare.[15]

The DLE now puts the button of clothing first and adds the push button or knob that works a device, the button of a wind instrument's valve, and the centre of the flowers of the daisy family.[4] In Argentina botón is a police officer, from the buttons of the uniform, and an informer.[4][11][16] In Puerto Rico and the Dominican Republic it is the young spur of a fighting cock.[17][18] The derivative botones “bellboy” is a 20th-century word, missing from the Academy's dictionary of 1899.[2][3]

Timeline

  • 1258 – first record, in the sense “button of clothing”.[2][3]
  • c. 1295 – the Gran conquista de Ultramar compares rings to botones de oro.[12]
  • 1317–1318 – an inventory of jewels lists botones.[19]
  • c. 1495 – Nebrija records the bud sense, the cautery and the derivatives abotonar and desabotonar.[13][2]
  • 1543 – the earliest record from the Americas, in Panama.[20]
  • 1611 – Covarrubias calls the word French.[14]
  • 1726 – Autoridades records the door knob, the fencing button and the flower bud.[15]
  • 1884 – the Academy's dictionary derives it from boto.[9]
  • 1917 – Alemany records the Argentine sense “police officer”.[21]

Meanings

Noun

  1. A button on a garment, usually round and flat, passed through a buttonhole to fasten it: Se le cayó un botón de la chaqueta.[4][1]
  2. Anything shaped like a button.[4]
  3. A push button or knob that is pressed or turned to start, stop or regulate a device: Pulsa el botón rojo para apagarla.[4][1]
  4. (botany) A bud; a closed flower bud.[4][1]
  5. A knob screwed onto an object to serve as a handle or stop.[4]
  6. (fencing) The round iron tip put on a sword or foil so that it does not wound.[4][1]
  7. (music) The key of a valved wind instrument; on bowed instruments, the button that holds the tailpiece.[4][1]
  8. (Argentina, colloquial) A police officer; an informer.[4][16]

Word family

  • abotonar
  • desabotonar
  • botones

Usage notes

Botón de muestra is a sample or sign of something, and the proverb para muestra basta un botón “one button is enough as a sample” is built on it.[4][1] Botón de oro is the buttercup.[4]

References

  1. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
  2. ^ 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, 645
  3. ^ a b c d Corominas, Joan (1973), Breve diccionario etimológico de la lengua castellana, 3rd ed., Madrid: Gredos, p. s.v. botón
  4. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n 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. botón
  5. ^ Gómez de Silva, Guido (1988), Breve diccionario etimológico de la lengua española, México: Fondo de Cultura Económica / El Colegio de México, p. 123
  6. ^ Cunha, Antônio Geraldo da (2010), Dicionário etimológico da língua portuguesa, 4th ed., Rio de Janeiro: Lexikon, p. 569
  7. ^ Bénaben, Michel (2000), Dictionnaire étymologique de l'espagnol, Paris: Ellipses, p. s.v. botón
  8. ^ Battaner Arias, Paz (dir.) (2017), Diccionario general de la lengua española VOX, Barcelona: Larousse Editorial, p. s.v. botón
  9. ^ 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. 165
  10. ^ Real Academia Española (1899), Diccionario de la lengua castellana, 13th ed., Madrid: Imprenta de los Sres. Hernando y Compañía, p. 152
  11. ^ a b Real Academia Española (2001), Diccionario de la lengua española, 22nd ed., Madrid: Espasa-Calpe, p. s.v. botón
  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. 543
  13. ^ a b Nebrija, Antonio de (1513), Vocabulario español-latino, Salamanca, ed. Marina Vidal Díez (2007), Biblioteca Virtual Miguel de Cervantes, p. 305
  14. ^ 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. 1, 336
  15. ^ a b Real Academia Española (1726–1739), Diccionario de la lengua castellana (Diccionario de Autoridades), 6 vols., Madrid: Francisco del Hierro, p. 1
  16. ^ 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. botón
  17. ^ Academia Puertorriqueña de la Lengua Española; Universidad de Puerto Rico, Tesoro lexicográfico del español de Puerto Rico, https://tesoro.pr, p. s.v. botón
  18. ^ Academia Dominicana de la Lengua; Instituto Guzmán Ariza de Lexicografía (2024), Diccionario del español dominicano, 2nd ed., online at https://ded.igalex.org, p. s.v. botón
  19. ^ Diccionario del Español Medieval electrónico (DEMel), data publication 2026 (CC BY-SA), Universität Rostock, p. s.v. botón
  20. ^ 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. botón
  21. ^ Alemany y Bolufer, José (1917), Diccionario de la lengua española, Barcelona: Ramón Sopena, p. 269

Related etymologies

Cite this entry

“Botón.” Etymologically, 7 Nov. 2026, etymologically.com/es/bot%C3%B3n. Accessed 7 Nov. 2026.

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