macho

macho¹ male

Pronunciation

• /ˈmat͡ʃo/, [ˈma.t͡ʃo]^[1]

Forms

macho (feminine macha, masculine plural machos, feminine plural machas)^[1]

Etymology

The word for “male” is inherited from Vulgar Latin *masclus, the contracted form of Latin masculus (“male”), itself a diminutive of mās (“male”).^[2][3][4][1] Old Spanish had maslo, in Berceo, Alfonso X and Juan Manuel, and the dialectal masclo, beside macho.^[2][5] Meyer-Lübke took ⟨macho⟩ for a Portuguese loan, but Corominas rejects this: after a consonant, Latin /kl/, /pl/ and /fl/ regularly give /tʃ/ in Castilian.^[6][2]

The same Latin word is Portuguese macho, Galician macho, Asturian machu, Aragonese masclo, Catalan mascle, Occitan mascle, French mâle and Italian maschio.^[7][6][8] Aragonese and Navarrese also have masto, which Corominas explains as an earlier ⟨mascho⟩ that lost its palatal sound.^[2][7] The diminutive replaced the simple word in the Romance languages, and the simple word itself has no known cognates elsewhere.^[9] The learned doublet is másculo, and masculino (1438) is taken from masculīnus.^[1][3]

Earliest recorded meaning

The earliest hit in the CDH is La fazienda de Ultra Mar (c. 1200, in a 13th-century copy), where Pharaoh orders the Hebrew midwives: „Quando nasciesse el fijo maslo que lo matassen” “when a male child was born, they should kill it”.^[10] The form ⟨macho⟩ appears in the Semejanza del mundo (c. 1223), of stones found in eagles' nests „macho e fenbra” “male and female”.^[10] Corominas's first records are Berceo's maslo and ⟨macho⟩ in the Calila e Dimna of 1251.^[2][3]

Semantic evolution

Already in Alfonso X's prose the word was applied to plants that fertilise others and to a piece that fits into another, as a lid set „maslo en fembra” “male into female” on a jar.^[5] As a noun it named some male animals in particular, above all the he-goat: in the butchers' shops of the 18th century macho meant the macho cabrío.^[2][11] Old maslo also meant “penis”, which led to “root of the tail” and “stalk”, and to the marlo “maize cob” of the Río de la Plata.^[2] Covarrubias (1611) adds that whatever is strong is called macho, as vino macho, and that the hooks and eyes of a clasp are called machos y hembras.^[12] Machorra “barren” (1495) shows the old habit of calling a fruitless plant or animal male.^[2][3]

The sense “mule” is recorded from about 1450, in Juan de Mena, and is common only from the Quijote (1605).^[13][3] Corominas follows Carolina Michaëlis in deriving it from Portuguese macho, earlier muacho, a derivative of muu “mule”, from Latin mūlus;^[13][14] Rohlfs held it to be the same word as macho “male”.^[13][14] The DLE keeps “mule” as a sense of this word, while Vox treats the mule as a separate word, probably borrowed from Portuguese in the 15th century.^[4][15]

Today macho is also a man who shows, or boasts of, the qualities thought proper to his sex, and in Spain a familiar way of addressing a man.^[4][16] In Cuba it means “pig” and, there and in Mexico and the Dominican Republic, a grain of rice still in its husk; in Costa Rica a macho or macha is a fair-haired person.^{[17][4][18][19]} In Mexico and Cuba macho distinguishes varieties of plants without any reference to sex, as in plátano macho.^[20][21] English borrowed macho for a male animal by 1848, as a noun for a “tough guy” in 1928 and as an adjective by 1943;^[22][23] French took it up in the 1970s.^[22][23]

Timeline

• c. 1200 – maslo in La fazienda de Ultra Mar (13th-century copy).^[10]
• c. 1223 – macho in the Semejanza del mundo.^[10]
• 1251 – macho in the Calila e Dimna.^[2][3]
• 1277 – Alfonso X's astronomical books use maslo en fembra for a piece fitted into another.^[5]
• c. 1450 – first record of the sense “mule”, in Juan de Mena.^[3][13]
• 1495 – machorra “barren”.^[3]
• 1513 – first record from the Americas, in Puerto Rico.^[24]
• 1611 – Covarrubias records the senses “mule”, “he-goat” and “strong”.^[12]
• 1848 – English macho “male animal”.^[22]
• 1884 – the Academy gives the etymology “Del lat. masculus”.^[25]
• 1928 – English macho “tough guy”.^[22]

Meanings

Noun

1. A male animal; often after a noun of common gender: una jirafa macho.^[4][1]
2. A male mule.^[4][11]
3. (botany) A male plant, which produces the pollen; mostly after the noun: un laurel macho.^[4]
4. The projecting piece that fits into another, as in a plug or a hook and eye.^[4][26]
5. The root of the tail of a quadruped.^[4]
6. A man who shows the qualities thought typical of his sex, especially strength and courage; also adjective, sometimes pejorative: Presume de macho.^[4]
7. (colloquial) Used to address a man: ¡Venga, macho, date prisa!^[4]
8. (architecture) A masonry pillar.^[4]
9. (engineering) The core of a mould, which forms the hollows of a casting.^[4]
10. (nautical) Each pintle of a rudder.^[4]
11. (prosody) A stanza, usually of three lines, sung after certain flamenco songs.^[4]
12. (bullfighting) (mostly in the plural) The tasselled cords of a bullfighter's costume, especially those tied below the knee.^[4][27]
13. (Cuba, Mexico, Dominican Republic) A grain of rice still in its husk.^[4][18]
14. (Cuba) A pig.^[4][17]

Adjective

1. Male.^[1]
2. Strong, brave.^[1][26]
3. (Costa Rica) Fair-haired, blond.^[1][18]

Word family

• machismo
• machista
• machorra
• machón
• marimacho
• machihembrar
• machuelo
• macho cabrío

macho² sledgehammer

Pronunciation

• /ˈmat͡ʃo/, [ˈma.t͡ʃo]^[1]

Forms

macho m (plural machos)^[1]

Etymology

The word for the smith's sledgehammer is of uncertain origin.^[28][3] The DLE and García de Diego, like Diez and Meyer-Lübke before them, hold that the word is inherited from Latin marculus (“small hammer”), and Moliner gives this with a question mark.^{[4][29][30][26][28]} Diez supported the loss of /r/ with alcachofa beside alcarchofa and sachar from sarculō.^[28] Corominas objects that no form *marcho is known, that the Latin word meant a hammer rather than a mallet, and that its rival martulus, martellus seems to have been the only type in Vulgar Latin, as it is general in Romance.^[28]

Corominas therefore takes the word for a Mozarabic doublet of its synonym mazo.^[28][3][23] In support he cites remachar, which replaced Berceo's remazar, and machucar, which he traces to a Mozarabic noun keeping the voiceless consonant of *matteuca (“club”).^[28] He also allows that it might be the word for “male”, from the size of the tool, but doubts that the likeness of the two words is chance.^[28] The Latin noun is a diminutive of marcus (“hammer”);^[31][32][1] Wiktionary reports a disputed connection with Proto-Indo-European *melh₂- (“to grind”).^[31][32][1]

Earliest recorded meaning

The first record is in Alfonso de Palencia's Latin–Spanish dictionary of 1490: „martellus es mediano martillo, como al mayor llaman macho” “martellus is a middle-sized hammer, as the larger one is called macho”.^[28][3]

Semantic evolution

Covarrubias (1611) uses macho for the smiths' bench on which the small anvil is fixed, and explains the name by the way they sit astride it, as on a horse.^[12][28] The Diccionario de Autoridades defines it as the big hammer of the forges, and the Academy's 1843 edition adds the bench and the square anvil, the three senses the DLE still gives.^[11][33][4] The family of the word is much richer than the noun: machar “to pound” (1490), the phrase a macha martillo “solidly” (1438), machucar (1251), machacar (1605, from machucar) and remachar (1490).^[3][28] In Argentina a macho and a macho y martillo mean “firmly, solidly built”.^[34][19]

Timeline

• 1251 – machucar “to crush” in the Calila e Dimna.^[28][3]
• 1438 – a macha martillo in the Corbacho.^[28][3]
• 1490 – Alfonso de Palencia records macho for the larger hammer.^[28][3]
• 1611 – Covarrubias applies it to the smith's bench.^[12]
• 1843 – the Academy's dictionary lists the hammer, the bench and the square anvil.^[33]
• 1917 – Alemany derives it from Latin marculus.^[32]

Meanings

Noun

1. A large sledgehammer used in forges to work iron.^[4][1]
2. The bench on which a smith keeps the small anvil.^[4]
3. A square anvil.^[4]

Word family

• machar
• machacar
• machucar
• remachar