coelho

Forms

coelho m (plural coelhos, feminine coelha, feminine plural coelhas)^[1] Houaiss records conelio in 1102, cõello in the 13th century and coelho in the 14th;^[2][3] Cunha has coẽllo in the 13th century.^[2][3]

Etymology

It is inherited from Latin cuniculus (“rabbit”), through the spoken Latin of the Peninsula, written Old Galician-Portuguese cõello and Old Galician-Portuguese cõelho in the oldest texts.^[2][3][1] The Latin /n/ between vowels was lost and left a nasal vowel, marked with a tilde in the old spelling.^[2][1] The Portuguese /e/ points to a short /i/ in the Latin second syllable, while the other Romance forms point to a long one.^[4]

The same Latin word is Galician coello, Spanish conejo, Asturian coneyu, Catalan conill, Occitan conilh and Old French conil.^[5][6][1]

Lewis & Short call the Latin word Spanish, and the OLD, citing Pliny, suggests it may be Iberian.^[7][8] Corominas and Nascentes also take it to be pre-Roman, and Wiktionary suggests an Iberian or Celtiberian word with the Latin diminutive ending, comparing Basque untxi (“rabbit”).^[9][10][1] In Latin the word also meant an underground passage or mine.^[8] Nascentes takes the burrow as the first sense and the animal as named after it, while Lewis & Short derive the tunnel from the burrowing animal.^[10][7]

Earliest recorded meaning

Houaiss's first date, 1102, comes from Machado and shows the form conelio.^[2] In the satirical cantigas of the 13th century a man is mocked for stealing rabbits, furtar cõel[h]os, and hiding cloth under his cape.^[11][3]

Semantic evolution

The word has kept its sense;^[12][13] Barbosa (1611) already has the proverb de hũa cajadada matar dous coelhos “to kill two rabbits with one blow”, and Bluteau names a fish called coelho and the surname Coelho, which began as a nickname.^[12][13] Morais (1789) records dente de coelho “rabbit's tooth” for something hard to understand.^[14]

In Brazil coelho is group ten of the jogo do bicho, a former ten-cruzeiro note, and a supporter of América Futebol Clube of Minas Gerais; in sport it is a pacemaker who leads a race for a time.^[2][15] The word passed into Kabuverdianu as kuedju and into Malay and Tetum.^[1]

Timeline

• 1102 – conelio, the first record given by Houaiss after Machado.^[2]
• 13th century – cõello and cõelhos in the cantigas.^[2][11]
• 14th century – the spelling coelho.^[2]
• 1534 – coelho in a private letter.^[16]
• 1569 – Cardoso translates Coelho as Latin cuniculus.^[17]
• 1611 – Barbosa records the proverb about two rabbits killed with one blow.^[12]
• 1789 – Morais records dente de coelho.^[14]

Meanings

Noun

1. rabbit, a burrowing lagomorph of the hare family, smaller than the lebre.^[2][1]
2. The meat of the rabbit as food.^[2][18]
3. The dressed skin of the rabbit.^[19]
4. (Brazil) In the jogo do bicho, group ten (the numbers 37 to 40).^[2][15]
5. (sport) A pacemaker, a runner who leads the field for part of a race without competing.^[2]

Word family

• coelheira
• coelheiro

Related words

• Latin cuniculus
• Spanish conejo

Usage notes

Matar dois coelhos de uma cajadada “to kill two rabbits with one blow” means to get two results from one effort.^[2][18]

References

1. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n Houaiss, Antônio; Villar, Mauro de Salles (2001), Dicionário Houaiss da língua portuguesa, Rio de Janeiro: Objetiva, p. s.v. coelho
3. ^ a b c d Cunha, Antônio Geraldo da (2010), Dicionário etimológico da língua portuguesa, 4th ed., Rio de Janeiro: Lexikon, p. s.v. coelho
4. ^ Corominas, Joan; Pascual, José A. (1980–1991), Diccionario crítico etimológico castellano e hispánico, 6 vols., Madrid: Gredos, p. 2, 173
5. ^ García de Diego, Vicente (1985), Diccionario etimológico español e hispánico, 2nd ed., Madrid: Espasa-Calpe (1st ed. 1954), p. s.v. cuniculus
6. ^ Nascentes, Antenor (1955), Dicionário etimológico da língua portuguesa, vol. 1: Nomes comuns, Rio de Janeiro (1st ed. 1932, preface by W. Meyer-Lübke), p. s.v. coelho
7. ^ a b Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press, p. s.v. cuniculus
8. ^ a b Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
9. ^ Corominas, Joan (1973), Breve diccionario etimológico de la lengua castellana, 3rd ed., Madrid: Gredos, p. s.v. conejo
10. ^ a b Nascentes, Antenor (1966), Dicionário etimológico resumido, Rio de Janeiro: Instituto Nacional do Livro, p. s.v. coelho
11. ^ a b Universo Cantigas: Glosario da poesía medieval profana galego-portuguesa, A Coruña: Instituto da Lingua e Literatura (ILLA), Universidade da Coruña, https://www.universocantigas.gal, p. s.v. coelho
12. ^ a b c Barbosa, Agostinho (1611), Dictionarium lusitanicolatinum, Braga: Fructuoso Lourenço de Basto (CLP transcription, Universidade de Aveiro), p. s.v. coelho
13. ^ a b Bluteau, Raphael (1712–1728), Vocabulario portuguez e latino, 8 vols. + 2 supplement vols., Coimbra / Lisboa (CLP transcription, Universidade de Aveiro), p. s.v. coelho
14. ^ a b Silva, António de Morais (1789), Diccionario da lingua portugueza composto pelo padre D. Rafael Bluteau, reformado, e accrescentado, 2 vols., Lisboa: Simão Thaddeo Ferreira, p. 1, 282
15. ^ a b Ferreira, Aurélio Buarque de Holanda, Novo dicionário Aurélio da língua portuguesa, digital edition, p. s.v. coelho
16. ^ CLUL (ed.) (2014), P.S. Post Scriptum: Arquivo Digital de Escrita Quotidiana em Portugal e Espanha na Época Moderna, Lisboa: Centro de Linguística da Universidade de Lisboa, http://ps.clul.ul.pt, p. s.v. coelho
17. ^ Cardoso, Jerónimo (1569–1570), Dictionarium ex lusitanico in latinum sermonem, Lisboa: João Álvares (CLP transcription, Universidade de Aveiro), p. s.v. coelho
18. ^ a b Dicionário Priberam da Língua Portuguesa, Lisboa: Priberam Informática, https://dicionario.priberam.org, p. s.v. coelho
19. ^ Porto Editora (2013), Grande Dicionário da Língua Portuguesa, Porto: Porto Editora, p. 2184