cornaca
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Portuguese
Etymology
From Sinhalese කූරුව-නායක (kūruwa-nāyaka, “elephant trainer”), from කූරුව (kūruwa, “elephant department”) + Sanskrit नायक (nāyaka, “guide, leader”).
Pronunciation
- Rhymes: -akɐ
- Hyphenation: cor‧na‧ca
Noun
cornaca m (plural cornacas)
- mahout (elephant driver and keeper)
Descendants
Spanish
Etymology
Borrowed from Portuguese cornaca.
Pronunciation
Noun
cornaca m (plural cornacas)
- elephant guide, elephant trainer, mahout
- 2015 July 18, “El hermano de Aníbal pierde la cabeza”, in El País:
- El cartaginés, con su heterogénea hueste —la clásica mezcla púnica de africanos, hispanos y otros aliados— lastrada por la monumental borrachera que arrastraba su contingente de galos, lanzó su ataque con los elefantes (10 según Polibio, 15 según Apiano) al frente que le procuraron una ventaja inicial, aunque luego se volvieron hacia sus propias filas y sus mismos cornacas hubieron de matarlos con el clavo y el martillo que llevaban para el caso.
- (please add an English translation of this quotation)
Further reading
- “cornaca”, in Diccionario de la lengua española [Dictionary of the Spanish Language] (in Spanish), online version 23.7, Royal Spanish Academy [Spanish: Real Academia Española], 2023 November 28