gota

Forms

gota f (plural gotas)^[1]

Etymology

It is inherited from Old Spanish gota, inherited from Latin gutta (“drop”).^[2][3][4][1] The same Latin word is Portuguese gota, Galician gota, Asturian gota, Catalan gota, Occitan gota, French goutte, Italian gotta and Sardinian guta; the REW notes that it also means “gout” everywhere, and Romanian gută only “gout”.^[5][1][6]

The name of the disease is an approximate translation of Ancient Greek ῥεῦμα (rheûma, “flow, flux”): the Tironian Notes already gloss it with the Latin word for a drop.^[2][3] Gómez de Silva and Bénaben explain the name by the old belief that the disease came from drops of bad humours falling on the joints.^[7][8] The same sense passed into gout.^[1]

De Vaan gives no etymology for the Latin word.^[9] Wiktionary mentions a possible link with Proto-Indo-European *ǵʰewd- (“to pour”).^[1]

Earliest recorded meaning

The earliest record is in the Semejanza del mundo (c. 1223), where the moisture of the air forms en manera de gotas, “in the manner of drops”, and freezes into snow in the cold of the winds.^[10] Corominas's first record is the Libro de Apolonio (c. 1240), which has it for tears: bien se alimpiava los oios de la gota, “wiped the drops well from the eyes”.^[2][10]

Semantic evolution

The disease sense is recorded almost as early, in Berceo's Vida de Santo Domingo (c. 1236): prendiélo a las vezes una gota mortal, “at times a deadly gota seized him”.^[10][2] Alfonso X's Lapidario has the gout of the feet and the joints (gota artética) and also a drop-shaped spot in a stone.^[11] The phrase gota coral “epilepsy” is first recorded in 1490.^[2][3] Covarrubias in 1611 gives caer gota a gota and the use of gota for “nothing at all”, as in no he bebido gota.^[12] The DHLE dates this negative adverbial use from the Libro de buen amor (1330–1343).^[13]

The Academy's dictionary of 1817 has the guttae of Doric architecture, gota serena for blindness, and the proverb gota a gota la mar se apoca.^[14] Today the plural also names medicine given in drops, and in Colombia the word names a fungal blight of potatoes and other plants.^[4] In the Dominican Republic gota is epilepsy.^[15]

Timeline

• c. 1223 – the Semejanza del mundo has en manera de gotas.^[10]
• c. 1236 – Berceo uses it for a disease.^[10][2]
• c. 1240 – the Libro de Apolonio, Corominas's first record.^[2]
• 1250–1279 – Alfonso X's Lapidario has gota alos pies, gout of the feet.^[11]
• 1330–1343 – the Libro de buen amor uses gota for “nothing”.^[13]
• 1490 – the first record of gota coral “epilepsy”.^[3]
• 1520 – the first record from the Americas, in Cuba.^[16]
• 1611 – Covarrubias explains the name of the disease by humours falling on the joints.^[12]
• 1817 – the Academy's dictionary has the architectural sense and gota serena.^[14]

Meanings

Noun

1. A drop, a small, roughly round amount of a liquid: Caían gotas del techo.^[4][1]
2. (colloquial) A tiny amount, a pinch: Ponle una gota de leche al café.^[4]
3. (architecture) Each of the small cones or pyramids set as ornaments under the triglyphs; a gutta.^[4]
4. (medicine) gout, a painful swelling of the joints caused by deposits of uric acid crystals.^[4][1]
5. (Colombia) A fungal disease of plants such as the potato, which withers the stem.^[4][15]
6. (plural) Medicine given in drops: gotas para los ojos.^[4][1]
7. (Dominican Republic, rural) epilepsy.^[15]

Word family

• gotear
• gotera
• cuentagotas
• gotoso

Related words

• agotar
• Latin gutta
• French goutte
• English gout

Usage notes

Set phrases include gota a gota “drop by drop”, como dos gotas de agua “as like as two peas”, sudar la gota gorda “to sweat blood”, cuatro gotas “a light shower” and la gota que colmó el vaso “the last straw”.^[1][4]

References

1. ^ a b c d e f g h i j 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. 3, 183
3. ^ a b c d Corominas, Joan (1973), Breve diccionario etimológico de la lengua castellana, 3rd ed., Madrid: Gredos, p. s.v. gota
4. ^ a b c d e f g h i 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. gota
5. ^ Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter, p. 3928
6. ^ García de Diego, Vicente (1985), Diccionario etimológico español e hispánico, 2nd ed., Madrid: Espasa-Calpe (1st ed. 1954), p. s.v. gota
7. ^ Gómez de Silva, Guido (1988), Breve diccionario etimológico de la lengua española, México: Fondo de Cultura Económica / El Colegio de México, p. s.v. gota
8. ^ Bénaben, Michel (2000), Dictionnaire étymologique de l'espagnol, Paris: Ellipses, p. s.v. gota
9. ^ de Vaan, Michiel (2008), Etymological Dictionary of Latin and the other Italic Languages, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 7, Leiden; Boston: Brill
10. ^ 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. gota
11. ^ 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. gota
12. ^ 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. 926
13. ^ a b Real Academia Española (2013–), Diccionario histórico de la lengua española (DHLE), https://www.rae.es/dhle, p. s.v. gota
14. ^ a b Real Academia Española (1817), Diccionario de la lengua castellana, 5th ed., Madrid: Imprenta Real, p. 447
15. ^ 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. gota
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. gota