escota

Forms

escota f (plural escotas)^[1]

Etymology

The nautical word is borrowed from Old French escote (modern écoute), which is from Frankish *skōta.^[2][3][4][1] Corominas compares Dutch schoot, Old Norse skaut (“lower corner of a sail”), Middle Low German schōte and German Schoß (“lap”), the original sense being “lap”.^[2][3] Kroonen groups these words, with Old English scēat, under Proto-Germanic *skauta-.^[5]

Since the Old French word is found as early as the 12th century, in Wace, it cannot come from Middle Dutch, and the DCECH rules out a Scandinavian source on grounds of sound and meaning; from French it passed to the other Romance languages.^[2] Wiktionary, however, derives the French word from the Old Norse one.^[1] García de Diego takes the Spanish word directly from Dutch, and the Academy in 1884 from German.^[6][7] Covarrubias in 1611 derived it from the verb escotar, which he glossed “to gather in, tighten”.^[8]

The same word is Portuguese escota, Catalan escota and Italian scotta.^[6][9]

Earliest recorded meaning

The DCECH's first record is A. de Guevara in 1539; the BDELC gives 1538.^[2][3] The Diccionario de Autoridades quotes Guevara's Arte de marear, which presents it as a sailors' word: Y a la maroma con que templan las velas, dicen que se llama Escota “and the rope with which they trim the sails, they say, is called escota”.^[10]

Semantic evolution

The Diccionario de Autoridades explained that a sail always has two sheets, one at each lower corner, by which it is hauled towards the stern.^[10] Spanish sailors in Santo Domingo shouted larga la escota “let go the sheet” in 1573.^[11] The derivatives escotín and escotera appear in 1587, in G. de Palacio.^[2] 19th-century dictionaries record many phrases, such as cazar ambas escotas “to sail before the wind” and cambiar las escotas “to shift the jibs to the other side”.^[12][13] The DLE now marks the word as little used.^[4]

Timeline

• 1538 – the first record in the BDELC.^[3]
• 1539 – A. de Guevara's Arte de marear explains the word.^[2][10]
• 1573 – first record from the Americas, in Santo Domingo.^[11]
• 1587 – G. de Palacio has the derivatives escotín and escotera.^[2]
• 1611 – Covarrubias defines it as the rope that trims the sail.^[8]
• 1884 – the Academy's first etymology for it derives it from German.^[7]

Meanings

Noun

1. (nautical, little used) A rope used to haul in and trim a sail (vela); a sheet: Soltaron la escota y la vela flameó.^[4][1][14]

Word family

• escotera
• escotín

Related words

• French écoute
• Portuguese escota

Usage notes

Escota is also a form of the verbs escotar (“to cut to size” and “to pay one's share”) and the feminine of escoto “one of the Scoti”.^[15][16][1] The older dictionaries had a separate escota, obsolete in architecture for the moulding called escocia, and a Navarrese one for the stonemason's hammer called escoda.^[17][18]

References

1. ^ a b c d e Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g Corominas, Joan; Pascual, José A. (1980–1991), Diccionario crítico etimológico castellano e hispánico, 6 vols., Madrid: Gredos, p. 2, 709
3. ^ a b c d Corominas, Joan (1973), Breve diccionario etimológico de la lengua castellana, 3rd ed., Madrid: Gredos, p. s.v. escota
4. ^ a b c 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. escota
5. ^ Kroonen, Guus (2013), Etymological Dictionary of Proto-Germanic, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 11, Leiden / Boston: Brill
6. ^ a b García de Diego, Vicente (1985), Diccionario etimológico español e hispánico, 2nd ed., Madrid: Espasa-Calpe (1st ed. 1954), p. 5969
7. ^ 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. 451
8. ^ 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. 770
9. ^ Echegaray, Eduardo de (1887–1889), Diccionario general etimológico de la lengua española, 5 vols., Madrid: José María Faquineto, p. 202
10. ^ a b c Real Academia Española (1726–1739), Diccionario de la lengua castellana (Diccionario de Autoridades), 6 vols., Madrid: Francisco del Hierro, p. 3, 570
11. ^ 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. escota
12. ^ Domínguez, Ramón Joaquín (1846–1847), Diccionario nacional o gran diccionario clásico de la lengua española, 2 vols., Madrid: Establecimiento Léxico-Tipográfico de R. J. Domínguez, p. 734
13. ^ 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, 911
14. ^ Battaner Arias, Paz (dir.) (2017), Diccionario general de la lengua española VOX, Barcelona: Larousse Editorial, p. s.v. escota
15. ^ 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. escotar
16. ^ 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. escoto
17. ^ Real Academia Española (1869), Diccionario de la lengua castellana, 11th ed., Madrid: Imprenta de Don Manuel Rivadeneyra, p. 327
18. ^ Moliner, María (2007), Diccionario de uso del español, 3rd ed., Madrid: Gredos, p. s.v. escota