Talk:caboter

CNTRL : Centre National de Ressources Textuelles et Lexicales

Étymol. et Hist. 1678 (Guillet, Les Arts de l'homme d'épée, 3^epart., p. 75). Orig. obsc. On voit généralement dans ce mot un dér. du m. fr. cabo « cap », qui serait empr. à l'esp. cabo « id. »; mais comme ce mot est rarement et tardivement attesté (1614-38 d'apr. FEW t. 2, p. 344) alors que caboter est prob. bien antérieur (cf. caboteur), il peut paraître préférable de rattacher caboter directement à cap* avec, à l'intérieur du mot, passage de p à b dont on trouve maints exemples notamment en prov. (cf. FEW t. 2, p. 335a, 339-340a, etc.). La chronol. des faits semble s'opposer également à une dérivation à partir de Cabot, nom de deux navigateurs ital. des xv^e et xvi^es. (DEI, s.v. cabotare; Boulan, p. 64). Une dérivation à partir de cabot « têtard, crapaud » (L. Spitzer dans Z. rom. Philol., t. 46, pp. 593-594 et t. 48, p. 98) ou « tête » (P. Barbier dans R. Philol. fr., t. 20, pp. 249-250) est sémantiquement invraisemblable; cabot « tête » ne semble d'ailleurs pas attesté (v. FEW, loc. cit.).

Earliest attestation, 1678. Origin obscure.

Generally taken to be derived from Middle French cabo "cape", which would be borrrowed from Spanish cabo; but as this word is rarely and belatedly attested (1614-38 according to FEW [Französisches Etymologisches Wörterbuch] vol 2, p. 344), while caboter is probably much earlier (cf. caboteur), it seems preferable to derive it directly from cap "cape".

The chronology does not seem to support a derivation from Cabot, the name of two 15th/16th century Italian navigators.

A derivation from cabot meaning "toad" or "head" is semantically improbable.

--ABehrens (talk) 06:03, 27 January 2020 (UTC)

Oxford English Dictionary

Etymology: < French cabotage (also Spanish cabotaje, in Italian cabotaggio) in same sense; < French caboter to coast; whence French has also caboteur, cabotier, cabotin, cabotinage, cabotiner. Derivation uncertain.

Originally a shipping term of the north of France: M. Paul Meyer rejects Littré's guess from Spanish cabo cape, headland, as if 'to sail from cape to cape', as untenable phonetically and historically, and thinks the verb must be from the name of a kind of boat. The gloss cabo , trabe, nave occurs in (MS. Bibl. Nat. 1646 lf. 83 b) a 13th cent. copy of an older glossary; and Littré has cabot , chabot as north French equivalents of sabot, which is still applied to a small vessel running two or three knots an hour. (Brachet guesses that caboter may be from the surname Cabot ; which may have had the same origin, but compare cabot n.)

--ABehrens (talk) 06:03, 27 January 2020 (UTC)