chocar

chocar¹ to collide, to shock

Pronunciation

• Brazil: /ʃoˈka(ʁ)/, [ʃoˈka(h)]^[1]
• São-Paulo: /ʃoˈka(ɾ)/^[1]
• Rio-de-Janeiro: /ʃoˈka(ʁ)/, [ʃoˈka(χ)]^[1]
• Caipira: /ʃoˈka(ɻ)/^[1]

Forms

chocar (first-person singular present choco, first-person singular preterite choquei, past participle chocado)^[1]

Etymology

The word for colliding is borrowed from French choquer, according to Houaiss and Aurélio.^[2][3] Vieira, Figueiredo, the Academia's dictionary, Michaelis and Wiktionary derive it instead from Portuguese choque + -ar.^{[4][5][6][7][1]} Houaiss dates choque itself only to 1694, from choc.^[8]

Houaiss connects the French verb with an imitative root ⟨tchok-⟩, found also in Dutch schokken, German schocken and English shock, and reports Corominas's view that the imitative word could have arisen independently in Germanic and in Romance.^[2] The DHLF calls the French verb, first Old French chuquier (before 1250), of uncertain and probably Germanic origin, and finds a loan from Middle Dutch schocken difficult for its date.^[9]

Earliest recorded meaning

Houaiss dates this verb to the 13th century, from Cunha's index of medieval Portuguese.^[2] In Bluteau's dictionary (1712) its first sense is to strike one ball against another in the game of choca; he also uses it of any solid body striking another, of ships colliding, and of a clash in war.^[10]

Semantic evolution

Morais (1789) repeats Bluteau's senses: to hit a ball in choca, to strike, and to have a skirmish in war.^[11] The sense “to offend, to shock” came later: Vieira (1871) calls it a neologism taken from French, condemned by purists but much used.^[4] Figueiredo (1899) lists “to offend” beside “to collide”.^[5] Today the verb means both to crash into something, often in an accident, and to cause moral shock.^[2][6]

Timeline

• 13th century – Houaiss's first date for the verb.^[2]
• 1694 – first date of choque.^[8]
• 1712 – Bluteau: to hit one ball against another in choca; of ships colliding.^[10]
• 1789 – Morais lists the senses “to strike” and “to clash in war”.^[11]
• 1871 – Vieira calls the sense “to offend” a neologism from French.^[4]

Meanings

Verb

1. To collide with, crash into;^[2][3][1] (pronominal) to collide with each other: os carros chocaram-se no cruzamento.^[2][3][1]
2. To shock, offend or scandalize;^[2][3][1] (pronominal) to be shocked.^[2][3][1]
3. (pronominal, with com) To clash, not to go well together.^[6][1]

chocar² to brood, to hatch

Pronunciation

• Brazil: /ʃoˈka(ʁ)/, [ʃoˈka(h)]^[1]
• São-Paulo: /ʃoˈka(ɾ)/^[1]
• Rio-de-Janeiro: /ʃoˈka(ʁ)/, [ʃoˈka(χ)]^[1]
• Caipira: /ʃoˈka(ɻ)/^[1]

Forms

chocar (first-person singular present choco, first-person singular preterite choquei, past participle chocado)^[1]

Etymology

The word for brooding is of disputed origin.^[2][12] Houaiss thinks it probably formed from Portuguese choca + -ar.^[2] Cunha also places it under choca “large cowbell”, from Late Latin clocca (“bell”), a Late Latin word probably of Celtic origin.^[13] Aurélio derives it from choco “brooding”.^[3]

Machado proposed Vulgar Latin *cloccō, related to the Latin word for a bell, rather than an expressive form of Latin glōciō (“to cluck”), itself an imitative word, as Houaiss reports.^[2] Wiktionary and, with a “perhaps”, the Academia's dictionary take it from that Vulgar Latin verb, from the Latin verb for clucking.^[1][6] Nascentes, after Meyer-Lübke and Adolfo Coelho, also starts from that verb, with the influence of the brooding hen's cry.^[12] Carolina Michaëlis derived it from an imitative root ⟨clocló⟩.^[12] Meyer-Lübke compares Spanish cloquear and the Portuguese phrase for a “brooding hen”, noting that such words are partly new imitative formations.^[14]

Earliest recorded meaning

Cunha dates the verb, in the sense “to incubate”, to the 14th century.^[13] Lorenzo's chronology also has a 14th-century record, and quotes a cantiga of Fernan Garcia Esgaravunha with the adjective: e deyta bẽ galinha choca assaz, “and she sits well enough, a brooding hen”.^[15]

Semantic evolution

Pereira (1697) explains the verb as andar de choco, “to be broody”.^[16] Bluteau (1712) gives chocar òvos with Latin incubare.^[10] The figurative sense “to plot, to plan in secret” and the familiar “to be sickening for an illness” are in the original Caldas Aulete, with the intransitive “to go bad, to ferment”.^[17] Brazilian senses include “to frighten”, “to gaze at with longing”, “to wait for a long time” and, in the north-east, “to shy away from a fight”.^[2][3][18]

Timeline

• 14th century – first record, “to incubate”.^[13][15]
• 1697 – Pereira: andar de choco.^[16]
• 1712 – Bluteau: chocar òvos.^[10]
• 1789 – Morais: to sit on eggs until the chicks hatch.^[11]
• 1899 – first date of chocadeira “incubator”.^[13]

Meanings

Verb

1. Of a bird, to brood, sit on eggs to hatch them; also to incubate them artificially.^[2][3][1]
2. Of an egg or a chick, to hatch.^[1]
3. (informal) To be sickening for an illness: estar a chocar uma gripe.^[2][7]
4. (figurative) To plan or nurse an idea or plot in secret.^[2][3][1]
5. Of food, to go bad; of a drink, to go flat.^[2][1]
6. (Brazil) To wait for a long time.^[2][3]
7. (Brazil) To frighten;^[2][18] (north-eastern Brazil) to shy away from a fight.^[2][18]

Word family

• chocadeira
• choco