frasco

Forms

frasco m (plural frascos)^[1] The earliest records include flasco, and Autoridades still notes that some people say flasco.^[2][3]

Etymology

It is probably borrowed from Gothic *flaskō (“wicker casing for a bottle; bottle”), a Germanic word.^[4][5] The DLE gives the source as Proto-Germanic *flaskǭ, and compares Old High German flasca and Old Norse flaska.^[6][1] Wiktionary and Gómez de Silva take the Spanish word instead from Late Latin flascō, which Latin had borrowed from Germanic.^[1][7] Latin texts use the word for wine vessels as early as the Lives of the Fathers of Mérida.^[8][9] The Academy's dictionary of 1884 derived it from German Flasche, that of 1899 from a Latin word for a wine vessel.^[10][11] Covarrubias, as Autoridades reports, thought it a corruption of ⟨friasco⟩, because the vessel was used to chill drinks.^[3]

The same word is Portuguese frasco, first recorded in the 16th century, Italian fiasco, Catalan flascó and English flask.^[12][1][13] Spanish took fiasco from the Italian form in 1884.^[4]

The Germanic word may come from an older *flahtskō, from Proto-Indo-European *pleḱ- (“to weave”), which suits the sense “wicker casing”.^[1][14] Orel compares it instead with Lithuanian plókščias (“flat”).^[15][1]

Earliest recorded meaning

Corominas dates the word to 1570.^[4] The CDH has earlier records: Torres Naharro's Comedia Soldadesca (1517) has flascos, the accounts of Magellan's fleet (1519–1547) list fifty frascos for the muskets, and Alonso de Chaves (c. 1527) has frascos para pólvora “powder flasks”.^[2] In the Lozana andaluza (1528) it is a flask of wine: el frasco lleno “the full flask”.^[2]

Semantic evolution

The two early senses, a narrow-necked bottle and a horn powder flask for a gun, have lasted side by side.^[3][6] Autoridades defines both, and the first records from the Americas, from Puebla in 1551, are of arquebuses with their frascos.^[3][16] Its definition speaks of keeping liquors.^[3] Later dictionaries widen the contents to powders and pills.^[3][6] The DLE's phrase frasco de mercurio is a weight of three arrobas, the capacity of the iron flasks once used to ship mercury at Almadén.^[6] In Cuba and the Río de la Plata the frasco was a liquid measure of about two and a half litres.^[17] In Chile frasco can mean a drinking bout.^[18]

Timeline

• 1517 – Torres Naharro's Comedia Soldadesca has the form flascos.^[2]
• 1519–1547 – the accounts of Magellan's fleet list frascos for the muskets.^[2]
• 1528 – the Lozana andaluza uses it for a wine flask.^[2]
• 1551 – first record in the Americas, in Puebla, for a powder flask.^[16]
• 1570 – Corominas's first record.^[4]
• 1726–1739 – Autoridades defines the bottle and the powder flask and reports Covarrubias's derivation from friasco.^[3]
• 1869 – the Academy records Frasco as an Andalusian nickname for Francisco.^[19]
• 1884 – the Academy's dictionary derives it from German.^[10]
• 1884 – Spanish borrows fiasco from Italian.^[4]

Meanings

Noun

1. A small narrow-necked bottle or jar, usually of glass, for liquids, powders, pills and the like: un frasco de perfume.^[6][1][20]
2. (historical) A powder flask, usually of horn, for loading a gun.^[6][3]
3. The contents of a frasco: Se bebió un frasco entero de jarabe.^[6]
4. (Chile, colloquial) Excessive drinking, a drinking bout.^[18]

Word family

• frasquera
• enfrascar

Related words

• Portuguese frasco
• English flask

Usage notes

Frasco is also a familiar Andalusian form of the name Francisco.^[19][21] Frasco cuentagotas is a dropper bottle.^[6]

References

1. ^ a b c d e f g h Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f Real Academia Española (2013–), Corpus del Diccionario histórico de la lengua española (CDH), version 3.1, https://apps.rae.es/CNDHE, p. s.v. frasco
3. ^ a b c d e f g h Real Academia Española (1726–1739), Diccionario de la lengua castellana (Diccionario de Autoridades), 6 vols., Madrid: Francisco del Hierro, p. 3, 791
4. ^ a b c d e Corominas, Joan (1973), Breve diccionario etimológico de la lengua castellana, 3rd ed., Madrid: Gredos, p. s.v. frasco
5. ^ Bénaben, Michel (2000), Dictionnaire étymologique de l'espagnol, Paris: Ellipses, p. s.v. frasco
6. ^ 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. frasco
7. ^ Gómez de Silva, Guido (1988), Breve diccionario etimológico de la lengua española, México: Fondo de Cultura Económica / El Colegio de México, p. 317
8. ^ Cejador y Frauca, Julio (1905–1906), La lengua de Cervantes: gramática y diccionario de la lengua castellana en El ingenioso hidalgo don Quijote de la Mancha, 2 vols., Madrid: Jaime Ratés, p. 538
9. ^ Cabrera, Ramón (1837), Diccionario de etimologías de la lengua castellana, 2 vols., Madrid: Imprenta de Marcos Bueno, p. s.v. frasco
10. ^ 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. 508
11. ^ Real Academia Española (1899), Diccionario de la lengua castellana, 13th ed., Madrid: Imprenta de los Sres. Hernando y Compañía, p. 471
12. ^ Cunha, Antônio Geraldo da (2010), Dicionário etimológico da língua portuguesa, 4th ed., Rio de Janeiro: Lexikon, p. 1610
13. ^ Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
14. ^ Köbler, Gerhard (2014), Germanisches Wörterbuch, 5th ed., online, koeblergerhard.de/wikiling
15. ^ Orel, Vladimir (2003), A Handbook of Germanic Etymology, Leiden / Boston: Brill
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. frasco
17. ^ Alemany y Bolufer, José (1917), Diccionario de la lengua española, Barcelona: Ramón Sopena, p. 796
18. ^ 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. frasco
19. ^ a b Real Academia Española (1869), Diccionario de la lengua castellana, 11th ed., Madrid: Imprenta de Don Manuel Rivadeneyra, p. 368
20. ^ Battaner Arias, Paz (dir.) (2017), Diccionario general de la lengua española VOX, Barcelona: Larousse Editorial, p. s.v. frasco
21. ^ Echegaray, Eduardo de (1887–1889), Diccionario general etimológico de la lengua española, 5 vols., Madrid: José María Faquineto, p. 441