mote

mote¹ nickname, motto

Pronunciation

• /ˈmote/, [ˈmo.t̪e]^[1]

Forms

mote m (plural motes)^[1]

Etymology

The word for the nickname or motto is borrowed from Old Occitan mot (“word, saying”) or Old French mot.^[2][3][4][1] Corominas thinks that the literary senses, “satirical saying” and “short song”, were most likely taken from the language of the troubadours, and the chivalric sense “motto” from northern French, the international language of chivalry.^[2] In those languages the word was far more widely used than in Spanish, with the broad sense “word”;^[2] Spanish took only some of its narrower senses.^[2]

The Occitan and French word continues Latin muttum (“a mutter, a grunt”), a word of vulgar and late authors, used in phrases meaning “not to say a word”.^[2][5][6] It is a back-formation from muttiō (“to mutter, murmur”), of onomatopoeic origin, as if “to make the sound mu”.^[1][7] The same word is Catalan mot, while Italian motto was probably taken from French, as was the Spanish word.^[2][6][8]

Earliest recorded meaning

The first record is in Berceo's life of Saint Dominic of Silos, c. 1236 (in a late 13th-century copy): the saint's captive is beaten with whips and, worse, hears malos motes “wicked taunts” as he is called a dog, a heretic and a rogue.^[9][2] The sense is a mocking or satirical saying.^[2]

Semantic evolution

The Spanish senses all go back to medieval use.^[2] The mocking saying led to the sense “nickname”, which Autoridades documents at the beginning of the 17th century and which is already implied by Nebrija's mote lastimero, glossed as Latin dicterium “a gibe”.^[2][10][11] Taken in a favourable sense, the word meant a short maxim or motto, especially the device of a knight; in Berceo's Milagros it also names a short piece of music, a motet.^[2] Alfonso X used it for a brief message with a hidden meaning.^[12]

Covarrubias defined it in 1611 as a witty saying in few words, taken from the French word.^[13] He saw it as the base of the verb motejar “to find fault with someone”.^[13] Autoridades gave the maxim with a hidden meaning and, as a second sense, the nickname.^[14] The 1869 edition of the Academy's dictionary added the motto knights bore at jousts and tournaments, and the 1899 edition traced the word to French mot.^[15][16] The current dictionary puts the nickname first.^[4]

In the Canary Islands mote also meant a ticket in a raffle or lottery, recorded from about 1860.^[17][18]

Timeline

• c. 1236 – Berceo's Vida de Santo Domingo de Silos has malos motes “taunts”.^[9][2]
• 1246–1252 – Berceo's Milagros de Nuestra Señora has cinco motes, motes de alegría “five songs of joy” (in an 18th-century copy).^[9][2]
• 1280 – Alfonso X's General estoria uses it for a brief message whose sense is hidden.^[12]
• c. 1495 – Nebrija gives mote o motete as Latin epigramma.^[10][11]
• 1568 – first record in the Americas, in Guatemala, for satirical verses posted like lampoons.^[19]
• 1611 – Covarrubias derives it from French mot.^[13]
• 1869 – the Academy's dictionary adds the motto of the knights in tournaments.^[15]

Meanings

Noun

1. A nickname given to someone for some quality or circumstance of theirs: En el pueblo todos lo conocían por su mote.^[4][20][1]
2. (historical) The motto that knights bore as their device at jousts and tournaments.^[4][20][1]
3. (historical) The opening phrase of a courtly literary pastime of the Golden Age, which later verses had to gloss.^[4][20]
4. (historical) That pastime itself, the phrase with its glosses.^[4]
5. (rare) A brief saying with a hidden meaning that needs explaining.^[4][20]
6. (in the plural) The verses drawn by lot with the players' names in the game of estrechos.^[4][20]
7. (Canary Islands, dated) A raffle or lottery ticket.^[17][18]

Word family

• motejar
• motejo

mote² hulled maize

Pronunciation

• /ˈmote/, [ˈmo.t̪e]^[1]

Forms

mote m (plural motes)^[1]

Etymology

The word for boiled maize is borrowed from Quechua mut'i (“boiled maize”).^[4][1][21] Friederici records the word in every Quechua dialect, in Aymara muthi and, as an early loan, in Mapudungun, and notes its wide spread in Spanish America.^[22] Bertonio's Aymara dictionary of 1612 has motti (“boiled maize”).^[22]

Earliest recorded meaning

The first record is in José de Acosta's Historia natural y moral de las Indias (Seville, 1590): the bread of the Indians is maize, which they mostly eat boiled in the grain and hot, and call mote.^[21] Boyd-Bowman's earliest examples are from Peru, of 1599 and 1600, both for boiled maize.^[19]

Semantic evolution

Salvá's dictionary of 1846 recorded it for Peru, for maize boiled until the grains burst, eaten by the Indians and the poor of Quito.^[23] The Academy took it into its dictionary in 1884, as an americanism.^[24]

In Chile the word came to mean above all boiled and hulled wheat, sold in the streets, and pelar mote “to hull mote” came to mean “to gossip about someone”.^[25][26][27] In north-western Argentina it is a stew of hulled maize, meat and chilli, and on the Colombian coast a dish of yam or squash.^[28] In Chile and Peru it also means a slip in speaking or writing; the 2001 Academy dictionary connected this sense with the expression hablar mote con cancha, that is, speech “mixed up”.^[29][28][30]

Timeline

• 1590 – Acosta's Historia natural y moral de las Indias.^[21]
• 1599 – Peru: un poco de mote, mays cocido.^[19]
• 1612 – Bertonio's Aymara dictionary has motti.^[22]
• 1846 – Salvá records it for Peru.^[23]
• 1884 – first in the Academy's dictionary.^[24]

Meanings

Noun

1. (South America) Shelled and boiled maize, young or ripe, with or without its skin, eaten as food: un plato de mote con queso.^[4][28][1]
2. (Chile) A savoury dish or dessert of crushed wheat, boiled in lye and hulled.^[4][28][25]
3. (north-western Argentina) A stew of hulled maize with meat and chilli.^[28]
4. (Chile, Peru) A mistake in speaking or writing.^[4][28]