capillo

Forms

capillo m (plural capillos)^[1] Old Spanish wrote capiello, the usual form in the medieval records, beside rarer capillo and capello.^[2][3] Asturian has capiellu “hood, cone-shaped cap”.^[3][4]

Etymology

It is inherited from Old Spanish capiello, inherited from Vulgar Latin cappellus (“head covering”), a diminutive of Late Latin cappa (“hood, cape”).^[3][5][6][1] Corominas notes that the Latin diminutive is recorded in glosses of the 9th century.^[3][1]

The same Latin word gave Italian cappello, French chapeau, Occitan capel and Catalan capell, all meaning “hat”, while Portuguese capelo keeps a sense close to the Spanish one;^[3][7] Ramon Martí records Mozarabic kapél, and Basque has kapelu (“cap”).^[3][7] A Mozarabic variant capil occurs in a proverb that Correas records and, for a falcon's hood, in Pedro de Alcalá.^[3]

Spanish later borrowed relatives of the word from its neighbours: capelo “cardinal's hat” from Italian in the 16th century, chapeo (Castillejo, 1550) from French while ⟨-eau⟩ was still pronounced as a triphthong, the old chapelo from the older French form chapel, and chapó as a term of billiards.^[3][1]

The Late Latin noun itself is of disputed origin: Wiktionary's leading theory makes it a shortening of capitulāre, from caput (“head”).^[1] Coromines thinks Latin took it from a non-Italic language, perhaps Celtic or para-Celtic, though the Celtic languages offer no support.^[8]

Earliest recorded meaning

The first record is in the Cantar de mio Cid (c. 1140, known from a 14th-century copy), where the word is the head covering of the armour, worn over a linen coif: Allí se tollió el capiello el Cid Campeador, la cofia de rançal “There the Cid Campeador took off his capiello, the coif of fine linen”.^[3][9] The fueros of the 13th century list it among a horseman's arms: the Fuero de Alcalá (c. 1235) has capiello de fierro “iron cap”, and the Fuero de Cáceres puts it with the hauberk.^[9]

Semantic evolution

In Alfonso X's prose the word is both the helmet cap of the armour and a kind of pointed hat.^[10] By the time of Sem Tob (1350–1369) it was also a garment for the head, and Corominas lists the friar's hood and the hood or mantilla worn by women in some regions among its senses.^[5][3][11]

Covarrubias (1611) describes the white cap put on a child just baptised, a figure of the white garment of grace, and the hoods that the peasant women of Tierra de Campos wore as hat and mantilla, which the ladies of that land had made of silk and embroidery; he calls capillo de fierro an old name for the helmet.^[12] Autoridades defines the cap of newborn children, the baptismal cap and the fee paid to the church fabric for its use.^[13] The Academy's 1817 edition adds a run of objects that cover a tip or an end: the cover of a distaff, a reinforcement for the toe of a shoe, a falcon's hood, a flower bud, the silk cocoon and a net for rabbits.^[14] Gaspar y Roig record the proverb lo que en capillo se toma, en mortaja se deja, “what is taken up in the baptismal cap is left in the shroud”: habits of childhood last a lifetime.^[15]

In the Americas the word appears from 1568 in Guatemala, for the hoods of canons, and in 1575 in Mexico for a cap of featherwork.^[16] In Peru it is a keepsake handed out at baptisms, and in Honduras the top leaf of the tobacco plant.^[17][18] In León it is a sheepskin hood worn by shepherds in the rain and a paper cone for nuts or olives; in the Ribera del Duero hacer capillos means to cheat at work.^[19][20]

Timeline

• 1064 – the Latin Fuero de Jaca (in a copy of 1283) has capillos “hair”, Latin capillus, not this word.^[9]
• c. 1140 – the Cantar de mio Cid uses capiello for the cap of the armour.^[3][9]
• c. 1235 – the Fuero de Alcalá lists the capiello de fierro among a settler's arms.^[9]
• c. 1240–1250 – the Libro de Alexandre names capillos among weapons and armour.^[11]
• 1350–1369 – Sem Tob uses the word for a garment of the head.^[5][11]
• 1568 – first record in the Americas, in Guatemala.^[16]
• 1611 – Covarrubias describes the baptismal cap and the hoods of Tierra de Campos.^[12]
• 1726–1739 – Autoridades defines the newborn's cap, the baptismal cap and the church fee.^[13]
• 1817 – the Academy adds the falcon's hood, the shoe toe, the bud and the cocoon.^[14]
• 1884 – the Academy gives an etymology, from Latin capidulum, which later editions replaced.^[21][6]

Meanings

Noun

1. A linen bonnet for babies.^[6]
2. A hood and mantilla of the traditional dress of some regions.^[6][22]
3. The white cap put on a child at baptism (bautizo); formerly also the fee the church charged for the use of its cap: La madrina bordó el capillo para el bautizo.^[6][23]
4. A cloth that covered the offering, usually of bread, made to the church.^[6]
5. (falconry) A hood for hawks (capirote).^[6][22]
6. A stiffening in the toe of a shoe that keeps the toes from being hurt.^[6]
7. A cover for the bundle of fibre on a distaff (rocadero).^[6]
8. A net spread over the mouths of a warren after the ferret (hurón) is sent in, to catch the rabbits that bolt.^[6]
9. A linen bag for straining wax (cera).^[6]
10. A cocoon, a flower bud or the foreskin (capullo).^[6]
11. (Peru) A keepsake given out at a baptism;^[17] (Honduras) the top leaf of the tobacco plant.^[17]

Word family

• capellina
• capillejo
• encapillar
• capellada

Related words

• capa
• capelo
• chapeo
• capullo
• Catalan capell
• French chapeau

Usage notes

Capillo de hierro is an old name for the capacete, the helmet of the armour.^[6][12]

References

1. ^ a b c d e f Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ Diccionario del Español Medieval electrónico (DEMel), data publication 2026 (CC BY-SA), Universität Rostock, p. s.v. capillo
3. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k Corominas, Joan; Pascual, José A. (1980–1991), Diccionario crítico etimológico castellano e hispánico, 6 vols., Madrid: Gredos, p. 1, 833
4. ^ Academia de la Llingua Asturiana (2000), Diccionariu de la Llingua Asturiana, Uviéu: ALLA; online at https://mas.academiadelallingua.com/diccionariu, p. s.v. capiellu
5. ^ a b c Corominas, Joan (1973), Breve diccionario etimológico de la lengua castellana, 3rd ed., Madrid: Gredos, p. s.v. capillo
6. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m 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. capillo
7. ^ a b García de Diego, Vicente (1985), Diccionario etimológico español e hispánico, 2nd ed., Madrid: Espasa-Calpe (1st ed. 1954), p. 1405
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. 2, 525
9. ^ 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, p. s.v. capillo
10. ^ Kasten, Lloyd A.; Nitti, John J.; Gago Jover, Francisco (2002–), Diccionario de la prosa castellana del Rey Alfonso X, New York: Hispanic Seminary of Medieval Studies (electronic edition 2024), p. s.v. capillo
11. ^ a b c 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. 616
12. ^ 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. 427
13. ^ a b Real Academia Española (1726–1739), Diccionario de la lengua castellana (Diccionario de Autoridades), 6 vols., Madrid: Francisco del Hierro, p. 2, 145
14. ^ a b Real Academia Española (1817), Diccionario de la lengua castellana, 5th ed., Madrid: Imprenta Real, p. 173
15. ^ 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, 478
16. ^ 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. capillo
17. ^ a b c Asociación de Academias de la Lengua Española (2010), Diccionario de americanismos, Lima: Santillana; online at https://www.asale.org/damer, p. s.v. capillo
18. ^ Santamaría, Francisco J. (1942), Diccionario general de americanismos, 3 vols., México: Pedro Robredo, p. 304
19. ^ Le Men Loyer, Janick (2002–2012), Léxico del leonés actual, 4 vols., León: Centro de Estudios e Investigación San Isidoro; electronic version, Universidad de León, p. s.v. capillo
20. ^ Lamano y Beneite, José de (1915), El dialecto vulgar salmantino, Salamanca: Tipografía Popular, p. 322
21. ^ Real Academia Española (1884), Diccionario de la lengua castellana, 12th ed., Madrid: Imprenta de D. Gregorio Hernando (the first Academy edition with etymologies), p. 206
22. ^ a b Moliner, María (2007), Diccionario de uso del español, 3rd ed., Madrid: Gredos, p. s.v. capillo
23. ^ Battaner Arias, Paz (dir.) (2017), Diccionario general de la lengua española VOX, Barcelona: Larousse Editorial, p. s.v. capillo