bacalhau

English

Etymology

Portuguese bacalhau

Noun

bacalhau (uncountable)

1. Dried salted cod.

Portuguese

bacalhaus

Etymology

From Dutch bakaljauw, of uncertain origin. Possibly from Late Latin baccalaureus, baculum (“stick, staff”), referring to the way cod were split and dried on wooden sticks. Or, possibly from Basque bakailao. The Basque term may be either the source or the descendant of Dutch kabeljauw, cognates would then include French cabillaud and German Kabeljau.

Cognate to Italian baccalà, Spanish bacalao, Catalan bacallà.

Pronunciation

• (Brazil) IPA^(key): /ba.kaˈʎaw/ [ba.kaˈʎaʊ̯]

• (Portugal) IPA^(key): /bɐ.kɐˈʎaw/

• Rhymes: -aw
• Hyphenation: ba‧ca‧lhau

Noun

bacalhau m (plural bacalhaus)

1. cod
2. (Portugal, colloquial) vagina (woman's genitalia)

   Synonyms: see Thesaurus:vagina/translations

3. (Portugal, colloquial) handshake (grasping of hands by two people)

   Synonyms: aperto de mão, (Portugal, informal) passou-bem

Descendants

• → Hawaiian: pakaliao
• → Dutch: bakkeljauw
  • Berbice Creole Dutch: bakliau
  • Skepi Creole Dutch: bakliau
  • → Caribbean Hindustani: bacau
  • → Sranan Tongo: batyaw, bákjáu
    • → Dutch: batyaw, batjaw
    • → Saramaccan: bakajáu

References

• Roberts, Edward A. (2014) A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the Spanish Language with Families of Words based on Indo-European Roots, Xlibris Corporation, →ISBN

Further reading

• bacalhau on the Portuguese Wikipedia.Wikipedia ^pt