comino

Forms

comino m (plural cominos)^[1]

Etymology

It is inherited from Latin cumīnum (“cumin”), which is from Ancient Greek κύμινον (kúminon).^[2][3][4][1] A spelling cominum occurs in a Latin charter of 1288.^[5]

The same Latin word is Portuguese cominho, Galician comiño, Catalan comí, French cumin and Italian cumino.^[1][6][7][8]

It is already recorded as Mycenaean Greek ku-mi-no.^[9] It is thought to be a loan from a Semitic language: Beekes compares Biblical Hebrew כמון (kammōn) and Akkadian kamūnu, and Frisk suggested that Greek may have borrowed the word twice.^[9] Wiktionary also names Arabic كمون (kammūn) and traces the Semitic words back to the Akkadian one.^[1] Gómez de Silva likewise calls the Greek word Semitic, of the same family as the Hebrew and Arabic names of the plant.^[10]

Earliest recorded meaning

Corominas's first record is in the 13th-century customs tariffs of Santander, the Aranceles santanderinos.^[2][3] The CDH has the plural in the Libro de Alexandre (1240–1250, known from a 15th-century copy), where four mills grind pepper and another four grind cumin: más quatro muelen pebre, otros quatro cominos.^[11] In the Moamín (1250), a treatise on hunting birds, ground cumin is mixed into a remedy for bleeding.^[11] A 13th-century Gospel of Matthew has the Pharisees tithing la mienta e el aneldo e los cominos “mint, dill and cumin”.^[11][12]

Semantic evolution

From the start the word named both the plant and its aromatic seed, used as a spice and as a medicine.^[12][13] Covarrubias in 1611 distinguished a garden and a wild or “rustic” kind, and repeated the ancient belief that cumin turns the face pale, a trick of hypocrites, citing Horace and Pliny.^[14] The Diccionario de Autoridades also described both kinds and their medical uses.^[15]

The smallness of the seed gave the word its figurative uses.^[2] The Academy's dictionary of 1843 records no vale or no monta un comino, said to show contempt for a thing or to stress how little it is worth.^[16] Gaspar y Roig noted es or parece un comino, said of children just starting to walk.^[17] Today the word also names a very small person, especially a child, and a thing of no importance, above all in importar un comino.^[4][18] The verb cominear “to fuss over trifles” comes from the same idea.^[2]

In Colombia comino is also a tree of the laurel family with fragrant, insect-resistant wood.^[19][20]

Timeline

• 1200s – the Aranceles santanderinos, Corominas's first record.^[2][3]
• 1240–1250 – the plural cominos in the Libro de Alexandre (in a 15th-century copy).^[11]
• 1250 – the Moamín uses ground cumin in remedies for hunting birds.^[11][13]
• 1490 – Alonso de Palencia glosses Latin cuminum as comino, “the name of a herb”.^[12]
• 1513 – the first record from the Americas, two pounds of cumin in Puerto Rico.^[21]
• 1611 – Covarrubias describes the garden and wild kinds.^[14]
• 1843 – the Academy's dictionary records no vale un comino; the derivative cominear is in the dictionary by the same year.^[16][2]
• 1884 – the Academy gives the etymology, from Latin cuminum and Greek, for the first time.^[22]

Meanings

Noun

1. cumin (Cuminum cyminum), a plant of the parsley family with finely divided leaves and small white or pinkish flowers.^[4][1]
2. The aromatic seed of this plant, used as a spice and in medicine.^[4][23]
3. (colloquial) A very small person, especially a child.^[4][23]
4. (figurative) A thing of no value, mostly in negative phrases such as importar un comino “not to matter a bit”.^[18][23]
5. (Colombia) A tree of the laurel family (Aniba perutilis) with fragrant wood.^[19][20]

Word family

• cominear
• cominero

Related words

• cúmel
• cumínico
• Latin cumīnum
• Portuguese cominho

Usage notes

The phrase comino rústico is another name for the plant laserpicio.^[4] Dársele a alguien algo un comino is a rarer equivalent of importar un comino.^[4]

References

1. ^ a b c d e f Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f Corominas, Joan; Pascual, José A. (1980–1991), Diccionario crítico etimológico castellano e hispánico, 6 vols., Madrid: Gredos, p. 2, 159
3. ^ a b c Corominas, Joan (1973), Breve diccionario etimológico de la lengua castellana, 3rd ed., Madrid: Gredos, p. s.v. comino
4. ^ a b c d e f g 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. comino
5. ^ du Cange, Charles du Fresne, et al. (1883–1887), Glossarium mediae et infimae latinitatis, augmented ed. by Léopold Favre, Niort: L. Favre
6. ^ 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)
7. ^ Cunha, Antônio Geraldo da (2010), Dicionário etimológico da língua portuguesa, 4th ed., Rio de Janeiro: Lexikon
8. ^ Rey, Alain, ed. (1992), Dictionnaire historique de la langue française, Paris: Le Robert
9. ^ a b Beekes, Robert S. P. (2010), Etymological Dictionary of Greek, with the assistance of Lucien van Beek, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 10, Leiden; Boston: Brill
10. ^ Gómez de Silva, Guido (1988), Breve diccionario etimológico de la lengua española, México: Fondo de Cultura Económica / El Colegio de México
11. ^ 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. comino
12. ^ 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. 730
13. ^ 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. comino
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. 492
15. ^ Real Academia Española (1726–1739), Diccionario de la lengua castellana (Diccionario de Autoridades), 6 vols., Madrid: Francisco del Hierro, p. 2, 436
16. ^ a b Real Academia Española (1843), Diccionario de la lengua castellana, 9th ed., Madrid: Imprenta de D. Francisco María Fernández, p. 176
17. ^ 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, 606
18. ^ a b Moliner, María (2007), Diccionario de uso del español, 3rd ed., Madrid: Gredos, p. s.v. comino
19. ^ a b Santamaría, Francisco J. (1942), Diccionario general de americanismos, 3 vols., México: Pedro Robredo, p. 384
20. ^ 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. comino
21. ^ 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. comino
22. ^ Real Academia Española (1884), Diccionario de la lengua castellana, 12th ed., Madrid: Imprenta de D. Gregorio Hernando (the first Academy edition with etymologies), p. 263
23. ^ a b c Battaner Arias, Paz (dir.) (2017), Diccionario general de la lengua española VOX, Barcelona: Larousse Editorial, p. s.v. comino