coco

Forms

coco m (plural cocos)^[1]

Etymology

Corominas explains it as an expressive word of children's language, which first named galls and other round fruits, then the bogeyman, whose head was shown as such a fruit, and finally the coconut, named after the bogeyman.^[2][3] The DLE gives the same account.^[4] The name of the fruit was given by Vasco da Gama's companions in India in 1498, who compared the shell and its three holes with the face of the bogeyman, so that the fruit's name is borrowed from Portuguese coco.^[2][3][5][6] Corominas notes that no language of India has a similar word, and that Ibn Battuta had already remarked on the likeness of the shell to a face in 1330.^[2] The DRAE of 2001, Moliner and Bénaben take the bogeyman too from Portuguese.^[7][8][9]

Corominas holds that the word is parallel to, but not descended from, Ancient Greek κόκκος (kókkos, “grain, seed”) and its successor Latin coccum, because its vowel did not become a diphthong and the related Romance words vary in their vowels; he sets beside it Italian cocco (“egg”) in children's speech and French coque (“shell”).^[2] The REW and Wiktionary derive it from the Latin word.^[10][1] García de Diego leaves the choice open between Latin, Greek and an expressive or native base.^[11] In the north-west the family includes Galician coca (“large gall”), and in the Spanish of Galicia the word itself means “oak gall”.^[2]

Earliest recorded meaning

The DME's earliest example is from Fray Íñigo de Mendoza's Vita Christi, of the 15th century, where hacer cocos means to make faces: que os andan haziendo cocos “who keep making faces at you”.^[12] The fruit is first recorded in 1519, when Fernández de Enciso describes una fruta de palmas que se llama cocos “a fruit of palms called cocos”, from which wine is made.^[13] The DCECH dates the fruit to Fernández de Oviedo in 1526 and the bogeyman to the Lazarillo of 1554.^[2][3]

Semantic evolution

In the Lazarillo a child, frightened by his dark-skinned father, points at him and cries ¡mamá, coco!.^[14] Covarrubias in 1611 describes the Indian nut with its three holes like eyes and a mouth, and defines coco in children's language as a figure that frightens, deriving it, in the manner of his time, from Cus, a king of Ethiopia.^[15][16] The Diccionario de Autoridades has the fruit, the frightening figure and the grimace like a monkey's.^[14] The sense “grimace” is in Covarrubias.^[2]

The sense “head” is colloquial; the related coca “head” is recorded from 1438.^[4][2] In Spain comerse el coco means “to worry” and comer el coco a alguien “to brainwash someone”.^[9][4] The sense “percale” is Andalusian, Asturian and Peruvian.^[2] The coconut palm is recorded in Santo Domingo from 1546.^[17] English took coco “coconut palm” from Spanish and Portuguese in the 1550s.^[18]

Timeline

• 15th century – Fray Íñigo de Mendoza uses hacer cocos “to make faces”.^[12]
• 1498 – Vasco da Gama's companions name the fruit in India.^[2]
• 1518 – the Portuguese bogeyman appears in Gil Vicente.^[2][3]
• 1519 – Fernández de Enciso describes the palm fruit called cocos.^[13]
• 1526 – Fernández de Oviedo, the DCECH's first record of the fruit.^[2][3]
• 1546 – coconut palms are recorded on the coast of Santo Domingo.^[17]
• 1550s – English borrows coco “coconut palm”.^[18]
• 1554 – the Lazarillo de Tormes, the DCECH's first record of the bogeyman.^[2][3]
• 1611 – Covarrubias describes the coconut and the bogeyman.^[15]
• 1843 – first record of cocotero, probably from French cocotier.^[3]

Meanings

Noun

1. The coconut palm (cocotero).^[4]
2. The coconut, the fruit of this palm.^[4][1]
3. Each of the layers of the coconut; a cup or vessel made from its shell.^[4]
4. percale (percal).^[4]
5. A dark bead from the Indies, with small holes, used for rosaries.^[4]
6. (colloquial) The human head: Tiene el coco lleno de ideas raras.^[4][1]
7. (Mexico) A rap on the head with the knuckles (coscorrón).^[4]
8. The bogeyman, an imaginary being used to frighten children: Si no te duermes, vendrá el coco.^[4][1]
9. (colloquial) A grimace, a face made at someone.^[4]
10. (colloquial) A very ugly person.^[19][8]

Word family

• cocotero
• cocotal
• coquito
• comecocos
• quemacocos

Related words

• cuco
• Portuguese coco

Usage notes

The DLE has two other words spelled coco.^[4] Its coco² “weevil; coccus”, from Latin coccum and Greek kókkos, is two words for the DCECH: coco “grub, weevil”, an expressive word of children's language first recorded in López de Villalobos (died 1559), and coco “microbe”, taken from the Greek and not yet in the Academy's dictionary of 1899, which also forms gonococo, estreptococo and micrococo.^[4][20] Medieval coco “scarlet cloth; the plant that gives the scarlet dye”, in Alfonso X's General estoria, is a Latinism from coccum.^[21][20] The DLE's coco³ is a Cuban ibis, named after its call.^[4]

References

1. ^ a b c d e f Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m Corominas, Joan; Pascual, José A. (1980–1991), Diccionario crítico etimológico castellano e hispánico, 6 vols., Madrid: Gredos, p. 2, 110
3. ^ a b c d e f g Corominas, Joan (1973), Breve diccionario etimológico de la lengua castellana, 3rd ed., Madrid: Gredos, p. s.v. coco
4. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o 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. coco
5. ^ Gómez de Silva, Guido (1988), Breve diccionario etimológico de la lengua española, México: Fondo de Cultura Económica / El Colegio de México, p. s.v. coco
6. ^ Friederici, Georg (1947), Amerikanistisches Wörterbuch, Hamburg: Cram, de Gruyter, p. 196
7. ^ Real Academia Española (2001), Diccionario de la lengua española, 22nd ed., Madrid: Espasa-Calpe, p. s.v. coco
8. ^ a b Moliner, María (2007), Diccionario de uso del español, 3rd ed., Madrid: Gredos, p. s.v. coco
9. ^ a b Bénaben, Michel (2000), Dictionnaire étymologique de l'espagnol, Paris: Ellipses, p. s.v. coco
10. ^ Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter, p. 2009
11. ^ García de Diego, Vicente (1985), Diccionario etimológico español e hispánico, 2nd ed., Madrid: Espasa-Calpe (1st ed. 1954), p. s.v. coccum
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. 710
13. ^ a b Grupo IATEXT, Universidad de Las Palmas de Gran Canaria, AMERLEX: corpus of americanisms in early texts on the Americas (online database), p. s.v. coco
14. ^ a b Real Academia Española (1726–1739), Diccionario de la lengua castellana (Diccionario de Autoridades), 6 vols., Madrid: Francisco del Hierro, p. 2, 391
15. ^ 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. 473
16. ^ Covarrubias Orozco, Sebastián de (1611), Tesoro de la lengua castellana o española, Madrid: Luis Sánchez (Biblioteca Wordkers transcription, CC BY 4.0), p. 474
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. coco
18. ^ a b Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
19. ^ Battaner Arias, Paz (dir.) (2017), Diccionario general de la lengua española VOX, Barcelona: Larousse Editorial, p. s.v. coco
20. ^ a b Corominas, Joan; Pascual, José A. (1980–1991), Diccionario crítico etimológico castellano e hispánico, 6 vols., Madrid: Gredos, p. 2, 112
21. ^ 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. coco