Content deleted Content added
Line 2:
==Etymology==
The name [[chocolate]] most likely comes from the [[Nahuatl language]], indigenous to central [[Mexico]], although it may have been influenced by the [[Mayan languages]]. One popular theory is that it comes from the Nahuatl word ''xocolatl'' ([[International Phonetic Alphabet|IPA]] {{IPA|/ʃo.ko.latɬ/}}) derived from ''xocolli'', bitter, and ''atl'', water.<ref name="etymonline">The [http://www.etymonline.com/index.php?search=Chocolate&searchmode=none Online Etymological Dictionary] gives this origin.</ref> (''Xocolatl'' was a chocolate drink consumed by the Aztecs, associated with the Mayan god of Fertility). Alternate derivations include that of the Mexican philologist, Ignacio Davila Garibi, who proposed that "[[Spaniards]] had coined the word by taking the Maya word ''chocol'' and then replacing the Maya term for water, ''haa'', with the Aztec one, ''atl''." The Maya verb chokola'j, "to drink chocolate together", has also been suggested as an origin.<ref name="Exploratorium">''Exploratorium Magazine'' "[http://www.exploratorium.com/exploring/exploring_chocolate/choc_3.html The Sweet Lure of Chocolate]". URL accessed [[April 6]] [[2007]].</ref>. However, Micheal D. Coe, professor Emeritus of Anthropology and Curator Emeritus in the Peabody Museum of Natural History at Yale University, and coauthor of the book ''The True History of Chocolate'' (ISBN-0500282298), argues that the word xocolatl appears in "no truly early source on the Nahuatl language or on Aztec culture."
Recently, linguists Karen Dakin and Søren Wichmann found that in many [[dialect]]s of Nahuatl, the name is 'chicolatl', rather than 'chocolatl'. In addition, many languages in Mexico, such as [[Popoluca]], [[Mixtec]] and [[Zapotec]], and even languages spoken in the [[Philippines]] have borrowed this form of the word. The word chicol-li, refers to the frothing or beating sticks still used in some areas in cooking. There are two different sticks used, either a small straight stick with small strong twigs on one end, or a stiff plant stalk with the stubs of roots cleaned and trimmed. Since chocolate was originally served ceremonially with individual beater sticks, Dakin and Wichmann argue that it seems quite likely that the original form of the word was 'chicolatl', which would have meant 'beaten drink'. In many areas of Mexico, 'chicolear' means 'to beat, stir'.<ref name="Dakin">Dakin, Karen and Søren Wichmann. "Cacao And Chocolate" ''Ancient Mesoamerica'' (2000). 11: 55-75. ([http://journals.cambridge.org/action/displayAbstract;jsessionid=1BF0746D05123A67DCF73B7F229E39E4.tomcat1?fromPage=online&aid=55159 abstract]) [[Cambridge University Press]].</ref>
| |||