colher

colher¹ to gather, harvest

Etymology tree of colher¹

inherited borrowed derived

Latin legō

French lire

Italian leggere

Portuguese ler

Spanish leer

Latin colligō

Catalan collir

French cueillir

Italian cogliere

Portuguese colher

Romanian culege

Spanish coger

From the same root · colher¹

Latin allegō ← legō

Latin collēga ← legō

Latin dēlēctus ← legō

Latin dēligō ← legō

Latin dīligō ← legō

Latin ēligō ← legō

Latin intellegō ← legō

Latin lēctiō ← legō

Latin lēctitō ← legō

Latin lēctor ← legō

Latin lēctūra ← legō

Latin legenda ← legō

Latin legibilis ← legō

Latin legiō ← legō

Latin legūmen ← legō

Latin neglegō ← legō

Latin perlegō ← legō

Latin praelegō ← legō

Latin relēgō ← legō

Latin sacrilegus ← legō

Latin sēligō ← legō

Latin sublegō ← legō

Latin supellex ← legō

Portuguese lição ← legō

English coil ← colligō

English cull ← colligō

Latin collēctiō ← colligō

Latin collēctus ← colligō

Latin recolligō ← colligō

Pronunciation

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

Forms

colher (first-person singular present colho, first-person singular preterite colhi, past participle colhido)^[1] Houaiss records both colher and coller in the 13th century.^[2]

Etymology

The word for gathering and picking is inherited from Latin colligō (“to bring together, collect”), written Old Galician-Portuguese colher and coller in the 13th century.^[2][3][1] Houaiss explains the palatal ⟨lh⟩ from the first person singular of the present: the Latin form passed through *collio to ⟨colho⟩, and the /ʎ/ then spread to the whole verb.^[2] The learned doublets are coligir and coligar.^[1]

The same Latin verb is Galician coller, Asturian coyer, Spanish coger, Catalan collir, Italian cogliere and Romanian culege.^[1] The Spanish verb is recorded from 1074.^[4]

The Latin verb is formed from con- and legō (“to gather, pick”);^[1] Wiktionary also gives an analysis with ligō (“to bind”) as the second part.^[1]

Earliest recorded meaning

A Latin document of 1114, quoted in Lorenzo's chronology, already has the Romance subjunctive colam (que me colam ibi “that they take me in there”).^[5] In the 13th-century cantigas the verb means “to take hold of, catch”, “to receive, take in” and “to come upon, surprise”: Johan Garcia de Guilhade sings of a gran coita que por ela colhi “the great grief I received for her”, and Johan Baveca says that death cannot colher (catch) a woman.^[5][6][7] The sense “to gather in, harvest” is recorded in the same body of poems.^[7]

Semantic evolution

Pereira's dictionary of 1697 renders the verb with Latin verbs of picking and plucking (carpo, lego, decerpo).^[8] Folqman in 1755 adds catching someone in the act, laying hands on someone, inferring, and taking in the sails.^[9] Morais in 1789 lists the picking of flowers, fruit and leaves, seizing, inferring, and the gathering in of what is spread out, such as ropes, sails and nets.^[10]

Today the verb covers picking and harvesting, catching someone unawares, gathering information or donations, hitting a target or knocking a person down, and reaping a reward.^[2][11] The nautical sense “to take in (sails)” survives in the dictionaries.^[11][12]

Timeline

• 1114 – a Latin document has the Romance form colam.^[5]
• 13th century – the cantigas use the verb for catching, receiving and gathering.^[5][6]
• 1697 – Pereira glosses it with Latin verbs of picking.^[8]
• 1755 – Folqman records catching someone in the act, inferring and taking in the sails.^[9]
• 1789 – Morais adds the gathering in of ropes, sails and nets.^[10]
• 1899 – Figueiredo derives it from Latin colligere.^[13]

Meanings

Verb

1. To pick (flowers, fruit, leaves) from the plant; to harvest.^[2][11][14]
2. To take or draw something from a place: colher água da cisterna.^[2]
3. (figurative) To catch someone unawares; to overtake: A noite colheu-os ainda longe de casa.^[2][11]
4. To gather or obtain (news, data, information).^[2][11]
5. To hit (a target); to knock down, run over (a person).^[2][11]
6. To collect (donations, contributions).^[2][14]
7. To grasp, understand; to infer, deduce.^[2][11]
8. To obtain as a reward: colher os frutos do trabalho.^[2][11]
9. To grow (a crop).^[2][15]
10. (nautical) To take in (the sails); to coil (ropes).^[11][12]

Word family

• colhedor
• colhedeira
• recolher
• encolher
• escolher

colher² spoon

Etymology tree of colher²

inherited borrowed derived

French cuillère

Portuguese colher

Pronunciation

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

Forms

colher f (plural colheres)^[1] The medieval language wrote cullar, colhar and colher, with the plurals colhares and, in 1455, colleres.^[2][3][16]

Etymology

The word for the spoon is borrowed from French cuillère according to Houaiss; the French noun is recorded from the end of the 12th century and comes from Latin cochleārium (“spoon, spoonful”), from Ancient Greek κοχλιάριον (kokhliárion), a derivative of κοχλίας (kokhlías, “snail, snail shell; spiral”).^[2] Houaiss holds that the French word displaced the inherited medieval noun, seen in the plural Old Galician-Portuguese colhares, which came from cochlear (“spoon”).^[2] The DLP also takes the word from French.^[15]

Cunha, Aurélio and Michaelis derive the word directly from the Latin noun.^[3][14][11] Wiktionary traces it through cullar and collar to the same Latin word, with the influence of Old French cuiller.^[1] Nascentes takes it from Latin through the archaic colhar, and reports that Gonçalves Viana saw French influence in its ⟨e⟩.^[17][18] The REW instead derives the Portuguese word from Old Occitan culher.^[19] Nascentes thought the spelling ⟨culher⟩ would be better, the first vowel having been raised by the following palatal.^[18]

Galician culler, Spanish cuchara and Catalan cullera continue the Latin word, while Italian cucchiaio and the French noun come from its derivative.^[19][1] The Spanish noun is first recorded as ⟨culiare⟩ in a Leonese document of 910.^[20]

The Latin noun is formed from cochlea (“snail, snail shell”) with a noun suffix.^[1] The DHLF explains the spoon either by its shape, like a shell, or by its use for eating snails.^[21]

Earliest recorded meaning

Latin charters write the Romance word long before the vernacular texts: tres culiares in a document dated 910 or 880, and duos coliares “two spoons” in a charter of 1008.^[16] The first vernacular records are 14th-century: the Crónica Geral has hũa cullar pequena “a small spoon”, and a document of 1364 lists duas colhares de prata “two silver spoons”.^[16][2]

Semantic evolution

The word also named a due paid to the Crown: in 1339 colhar is recorded as a tax, and Viterbo explains that at Chaves it was the right to a spoonful of salt from each measure.^[16][22] Morais in 1813 adds the spoon-shaped tools of painters and masons.^[23] The derivative colherada “spoonful” is recorded from 1595.^[3]

Modern dictionaries add the mason's trowel (colher de pedreiro), a scoop-shaped fishing net and a spoon-shaped lure.^[2][11] Brazilian informal speech has de colher “easy, ready to hand” and dar uma colher de chá “to give someone a chance”.^[2] The Galician word culler also named the tadpole in the 18th century, and the old Caldas Aulete records the same sense for Portuguese.^[24]

The noun passed into Kabuverdianu as kudjer and into Itsekiri.^[1]

Timeline

• 1008 – a Latin charter lists duos coliares.^[16]
• 1339 – colhar as the name of a tax.^[16]
• 1364 – duas colhares de prata in a document.^[16]
• 1455 – the plural colleres.^[2]
• 1569 – Cardoso renders it with Latin cocleare.^[25]
• 1595 – first record of the derivative colherada.^[3]
• 1611 – Barbosa glosses it with Latin cochlear, citing Martial.^[26]
• 1813 – Morais lists the painters' and masons' tools of that name.^[23]
• 1871 – Vieira derives the word from Latin cochleare.^[27]

Meanings

Noun

1. A spoon: a utensil with a handle and a shallow bowl, for eating soft or liquid food or for stirring and serving.^[2][14]
2. A spoonful: duas colheres de açúcar.^[2][14]
3. Any of various spoon-shaped tools, especially the mason's trowel (colher de pedreiro).^[2][12]
4. (fishing) A scoop-shaped net with a handle.^[2][11]
5. (fishing) A spoon-shaped artificial lure.^[11]
6. (obsolete) A kind of royal due.^[2][22]

Word family

• colherada
• colhereiro
• colhereira