cohombro

Forms

cohombro m (plural cohombros)^[1] Old Spanish wrote cogombro and cogonbro from 1219; the form with ⟨h⟩ is first recorded in 1490.^[2][3] The Fuero de Alarcón has cohonbro.^[4] Dialect forms include colombro and cuyombro in Salamanca, calombro in Navarre and concombro in Judeo-Spanish.^[5]

Etymology

It is inherited from Old Spanish cogombro, inherited from Latin cucumis (“cucumber”).^[2][6][1] García de Diego starts all the Ibero-Romance forms from a form Late Latin cucumerus, recorded in a glossary.^[5] Wiktionary names the doublet cacombra.^[1]

The same Latin word is Portuguese cogombro, Galician cogombro, Catalan cogombre, Occitan cogombre, Old French cocombre and Italian cocomero.^[5][1][7]

De Vaan considers the Latin word probably a loan from a non-Indo-European language, and compares Ancient Greek κύκυον (kúkuon).^[8] Wiktionary calls it a wanderwort, perhaps ultimately from Sumerian or a Mediterranean substrate.^[1]

Earliest recorded meaning

The first record is of 1219 in the form cogonbro.^[2] The DEMel's first primary record is the Fuero de Plasencia of 1221, and the fueros of Zorita, Úbeda and Alarcón fine anyone who strikes another with a cucumber or anything else that can soil him, as in Alarcón: tod aquel que a otro firiere con huesso, o con badeha, o con cohonbro “whoever strikes another with a bone, a melon or a cucumber”.^[3][4]

Semantic evolution

Alfonso X's General estoria names cogombros among the vegetables of Egypt the Israelites missed.^[9] Covarrubias in 1611 said the long, twisted cohombros grown in Castile were not found elsewhere and horrified foreigners, who thought them like snakes.^[10] The refrain quien hizo el cohombro, que le lleve al hombro, that whoever caused a burden must bear it, was in the Academy's dictionary from 1817.^[11] In 1884 the Academy added the sense “fritter”, a strip of the dough of buñuelos shaped like the vegetable.^[12] Cohombro de mar, the sea cucumber, was first defined in 1899.^[13]

Timeline

• 1219 – first record, as cogonbro.^[2]
• 1221 – the Fuero de Plasencia, as cogombro.^[3]
• 1272–1275 – Alfonso X's General estoria.^[9]
• 1490 – A. de Palencia's Vocabulario has cohonbros.^[2][14]
• c. 1495 – Nebrija gives Latin cucumis.^[15]
• 1549 – first record in the Americas, in Santo Domingo.^[16]
• 1611 – Covarrubias.^[10]
• 1884 – the sense “fritter”.^[12]

Meanings

Noun

1. A garden plant, a variety of pepino (cucumber): En el huerto sembraron cohombros y melones.^[6][1]
2. The long, twisted fruit of this plant.^[6]
3. A churro, a fried strip of dough.^[6]

Word family

• cohombrillo

Related words

• pepino
• Latin cucumis
• Portuguese cogombro
• Catalan cogombre

Usage notes

Cohombro de mar is the sea cucumber, a holothurian.^[6][17]

References

1. ^ a b c d e f g Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e Corominas, Joan (1973), Breve diccionario etimológico de la lengua castellana, 3rd ed., Madrid: Gredos, p. s.v. cohombro
3. ^ a b c Diccionario del Español Medieval electrónico (DEMel), data publication 2026 (CC BY-SA), Universität Rostock, p. s.v. cohombro
4. ^ a b Real Academia Española (2013–), Corpus del Diccionario histórico de la lengua española (CDH), version 3.1, https://apps.rae.es/CNDHE, p. s.v. cohombro
5. ^ a b c García de Diego, Vicente (1985), Diccionario etimológico español e hispánico, 2nd ed., Madrid: Espasa-Calpe (1st ed. 1954), p. s.v. cucumis
6. ^ a b c d e 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. cohombro
7. ^ 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, 808
8. ^ de Vaan, Michiel (2008), Etymological Dictionary of Latin and the other Italic Languages, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 7, Leiden; Boston: Brill
9. ^ a b 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. cohombro
10. ^ 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. 480
11. ^ Real Academia Española (1817), Diccionario de la lengua castellana, 5th ed., Madrid: Imprenta Real, p. 210
12. ^ 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. 255
13. ^ Real Academia Española (1899), Diccionario de la lengua castellana, 13th ed., Madrid: Imprenta de los Sres. Hernando y Compañía, p. 237
14. ^ 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. 715
15. ^ Nebrija, Antonio de (1513), Vocabulario español-latino, Salamanca, ed. Marina Vidal Díez (2007), Biblioteca Virtual Miguel de Cervantes, p. 314
16. ^ 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. cogombro
17. ^ Moliner, María (2007), Diccionario de uso del español, 3rd ed., Madrid: Gredos, p. s.v. cohombro