cuello

Forms

cuello m (plural cuellos)^[1] Old Spanish texts also write cuelo and cueillo; the Cantar de mio Cid has cuelo beside cuello.^[2][3]

Etymology

It is inherited from Old Spanish cuello, inherited from Latin collum (“neck”).^[4][5][1] The short stressed /o/ of the Latin word gave the diphthong /we/ in Castilian, unlike Catalan.^[6] The same word is Portuguese colo, Galician colo, Asturian cuellu, Catalan coll, French cou and Italian collo.^[7][8][1] French also keeps col, the older form, of which the modern word was first the oblique plural.^[9]

Latin also had a masculine collus, the older form according to the DHLF.^[10][9] Its origin is uncertain: Wiktionary and Gómez de Silva take it from Proto-Italic *kʷolsom, from Proto-Indo-European *kʷolso- (“neck”), literally “that on which the head turns”, from *kʷel- (“to turn”).^[1][11] The DHLF also mentions a connection with *kel- (“high”), but prefers “turn”.^[9] Germanic has the same word in Proto-Germanic *halsaz, whence Old English heals and German Hals.^[1][10]

Earliest recorded meaning

The first record is in the Cantar de mio Cid (c. 1140, known from a 14th-century copy), where knights carry escudos a los cuellos “shields at their necks”.^[12][4] Elsewhere in the poem the Cid has el escudo trae al cuello and wears his cloak about his neck.^[13][14] The first copy written in its own time is the Fuero de Zorita de los Canes (1218–c. 1250), which fines anyone who bruises another en el cuello o en la cara.^[12]

Semantic evolution

Alfonso X's Lapidario (1250–1279) speaks of stones worn by women a los cuellos, like pearls.^[15] From the part of the body the word passed to the part of a garment that goes round it: in the Americas cuellos were sold with women's shirts in Puebla in 1556.^[16] Covarrubias (1611) records cuelliherguido “with the neck held high, arrogant” and the hypocrite's cuello tuerto, and links the word with collar.^[17]

The 1884 Academy dictionary already lists the neck of a vessel, the stalk of garlic or onion, the collar of a cassock and the collar of a shirt.^[18] Today the word also names the narrow part of any object, such as a bottle, a mast or a light bulb.^[5][19] In Argentina and Uruguay cuello is the head of foam on a glass of beer, and in Guatemala, Honduras and El Salvador it is the influence of a friend in authority.^[20]

Timeline

• c. 1140 – the Cantar de mio Cid has cuello and cuelo.^[4][12][3]
• 1211 – the HSMS texts have the word from this year.^[21]
• 1218–c. 1250 – the Fuero de Zorita de los Canes uses it in a list of injuries.^[12]
• 1255 – collar is first recorded.^[4]
• c. 1495 – Nebrija gives Latin collum for the neck of an animal.^[22]
• 1556 – shirt collars appear in an inventory in Puebla, Mexico.^[16]
• 1611 – Covarrubias records cuelliherguido and cuello tuerto.^[17]

Meanings

Noun

1. neck: the part of the body joining the head to the trunk.^[5][1]
2. The narrow upper part of a vessel, such as a bottle.^[5][19]
3. collar: the part of a garment that goes round or covers the neck: Llevaba la camisa con el cuello abierto.^[5][1]
4. A loose piece of lace, fur or the like worn round the neck, for warmth or adornment.^[5]
5. The narrowest part of an object, especially a round one, such as a mast or a bulb.^[5][19]
6. The stalk growing from a head of garlic or an onion.^[5][19]
7. (Argentina, Uruguay) The head of foam on a glass of beer.^[20]
8. (Guatemala, Honduras, El Salvador; colloquial) Influence with someone in authority, used to obtain favours.^[20]

Word family

• descollar
• alzacuello
• cuellilargo
• tiracuello

Related words

• collar
• cogote
• Latin collum
• Portuguese colo
• French cou

References

1. ^ a b c d e f g h 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. cuello
3. ^ a b Boggs, R. S.; Kasten, Lloyd; Keniston, Hayward; Richardson, H. B. (1946), Tentative Dictionary of Medieval Spanish, 2 vols., Chapel Hill, N.C., p. 155
4. ^ a b c d Corominas, Joan (1973), Breve diccionario etimológico de la lengua castellana, 3rd ed., Madrid: Gredos, p. s.v. cuello
5. ^ a b c d e f g h 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. cuello
6. ^ Prat Sabater, Marta (2003), Préstamos del catalán en el léxico español, doctoral thesis, Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona, p. 123
7. ^ García de Diego, Vicente (1985), Diccionario etimológico español e hispánico, 2nd ed., Madrid: Espasa-Calpe (1st ed. 1954), p. 1732
8. ^ Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter, p. 2053
9. ^ a b c Rey, Alain, ed. (1992), Dictionnaire historique de la langue française, Paris: Le Robert, p. s.v. cou
10. ^ a b Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press, p. s.v. collum
11. ^ Gómez de Silva, Guido (1988), Breve diccionario etimológico de la lengua española, México: Fondo de Cultura Económica / El Colegio de México, p. s.v. cuello
12. ^ a b c d Real Academia Española (2013–), Corpus del Diccionario histórico de la lengua española (CDH), version 3.1, https://apps.rae.es/CNDHE, p. s.v. cuello
13. ^ 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. 828
14. ^ Menéndez Pidal, Ramón (1908–1911), Cantar de Mio Cid: texto, gramática y vocabulario, 3 vols., Madrid: Bailly-Baillière, p. 201
15. ^ 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. cuello
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. cuello
17. ^ 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. 542
18. ^ Real Academia Española (1884), Diccionario de la lengua castellana, 12th ed., Madrid: Imprenta de D. Gregorio Hernando (the first Academy edition with etymologies), p. 316
19. ^ a b c d Moliner, María (2007), Diccionario de uso del español, 3rd ed., Madrid: Gredos, p. s.v. cuello
20. ^ 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. cuello
21. ^ Hispanic Seminary of Medieval Studies (2026), Old Spanish Textual Archive (OSTA): semi-paleographic transcriptions of Old Spanish texts, ed. Francisco Gago Jover et al., https://www.hispanicseminary.org, p. s.v. cuello
22. ^ Nebrija, Antonio de (1513), Vocabulario español-latino, Salamanca, ed. Marina Vidal Díez (2007), Biblioteca Virtual Miguel de Cervantes, p. 322