lardo

Forms

lardo m (plural lardos)^[1]

Etymology

It is inherited from Latin lārdum (“bacon fat, lard”), the contracted form of lāridum.^{[2][3][1][4][5]} Corominas notes that the word survives in all the Romance languages and is more popular in Catalan and Portuguese than in Spanish.^[2] The same Latin word is Portuguese lardo, Galician lardo, Asturian llardo, Catalan llard, Occitan lart, French lard, Italian lardo and Sardinian lardu.^[6][5][7]

De Vaan rejects a native derivation of the Latin noun, which would not give its vowel, and finds it likely that it was borrowed from a Greek form related to Ancient Greek λαρινός (larinós, “fattened, fat”), from λαρός (larós, “delicious, sweet”), with a change of suffix.^[8][1]

Earliest recorded meaning

The first record in the CDH is in the Moamín, a treatise on hunting birds of 1250 known from a copy of the second half of the 13th century: denles a comer del lardo del puerco salado quanto un almendra “let them be given salted pork fat to eat, as much as an almond”.^[9][10] The falconry and veterinary books of about 1300 use it in the same way, as an ingredient of remedies.^[9] Corominas's first record is the Libro de buen amor (1330–1343): mucho tozino, lardo que non era salpreso “plenty of bacon, lard that was not salted”.^[2][9]

Semantic evolution

Alonso de Palencia (1490) explained Latin lardum as what was “now called lardo”, the firmest fat of the pig kept in the house, and Nebrija gave lardo de puerco as the equivalent of lardum.^[2][11] Covarrubias in 1611 and Autoridades still defined it as the fat of bacon; in 1817 the Academy added the sense “fat or grease of animals”.^[12][13][14] In 1546 it was used in Santo Domingo of the blubber of sea lions, melted down and used as oil.^[15] Corominas notes that Autoridades quotes no examples and that the word is now old-fashioned or very regional, commonly replaced by grasa or gordura.^[2] It is recorded with the sense “bacon” in Leonese.^[16]

The verb lardar or lardear “to baste with lard” developed the senses “to beat someone badly” and “to punish someone by pouring boiling grease on him” (Cervantes), which Corominas compares with the French “to lard” > “to pierce with arrows or blows”.^[2] The jueves lardero, the Thursday before Carnival, is properly “fat Thursday”, from the pork eaten before the Lenten fast.^[17]

Timeline

• 1250 – the Moamín prescribes lardo del puerco salado for hawks (in a later 13th-century copy).^[9][10]
• before 1300 – the falconry books Gerardus falconarius and Dancus Rex use lardo del puerco in remedies.^[9]
• 1330–1343 – the Libro de buen amor, Corominas's first record.^[2][9]
• 1335 – first record of jueves lardero.^[17]
• 1490 – Alonso de Palencia says lardo is the current word for Latin lardum.^[2]
• c. 1495 – Nebrija gives lardo de puerco as lardum.^[11]
• 1546 – first record from the Americas, in Santo Domingo.^[15]
• 1611 – Covarrubias defines it as the fat of bacon.^[12]
• 1817 – the Academy's dictionary adds the sense “animal fat or grease”.^[14]
• 1884 – the Academy gives the etymology from Latin lardum.^[18]

Meanings

Noun

1. The fat part of tocino (bacon); lard.^[3][19][1]
2. The fat or grease (unto) of animals, especially of the pig.^[3][20]

Word family

• lardar
• lardear
• lardero
• lardoso
• lardón

Usage notes

Corominas calls the word old-fashioned or very regional; the usual words are grasa and gordura.^[2]

References

1. ^ a b c d e Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i Corominas, Joan; Pascual, José A. (1980–1991), Diccionario crítico etimológico castellano e hispánico, 6 vols., Madrid: Gredos, p. 3, 586
3. ^ 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. lardo
4. ^ Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press, p. s.v. lardum
5. ^ a b Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter, p. 4915
6. ^ García de Diego, Vicente (1985), Diccionario etimológico español e hispánico, 2nd ed., Madrid: Espasa-Calpe (1st ed. 1954), p. s.v. laridum
7. ^ Alcover, Antoni M.; Moll, Francesc de B. (1930–1962), Diccionari català-valencià-balear, 10 vols., Palma de Mallorca: Moll, p. s.v. llard
8. ^ de Vaan, Michiel (2008), Etymological Dictionary of Latin and the other Italic Languages, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 7, Leiden; Boston: Brill
9. ^ 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. lardo
10. ^ 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. lardo
11. ^ a b Lleal, Coloma (dir.), DICCA-XV: Diccionario del castellano del siglo XV en la Corona de Aragón, Barcelona: Universitat de Barcelona, Grup d'Estudis d'Història de la Llengua (GHCL), https://ghcl.ub.edu/diccaxv, p. s.v. lardo
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. 1067
13. ^ Real Academia Española (1726–1739), Diccionario de la lengua castellana (Diccionario de Autoridades), 6 vols., Madrid: Francisco del Hierro, p. 4, 362
14. ^ a b Real Academia Española (1817), Diccionario de la lengua castellana, 5th ed., Madrid: Imprenta Real, p. 518
15. ^ 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. lardo
16. ^ Le Men Loyer, Janick (2002–2012), Léxico del leonés actual, 4 vols., León: Centro de Estudios e Investigación San Isidoro; electronic version, Universidad de León, p. s.v. lardo
17. ^ a b Corominas, Joan (1973), Breve diccionario etimológico de la lengua castellana, 3rd ed., Madrid: Gredos, p. s.v. lardero
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. 630
19. ^ Moliner, María (2007), Diccionario de uso del español, 3rd ed., Madrid: Gredos, p. s.v. lardo
20. ^ Battaner Arias, Paz (dir.) (2017), Diccionario general de la lengua española VOX, Barcelona: Larousse Editorial, p. s.v. lardo