cattle

cattle
\ \ [13] Ultimately, cattle is the same word as chattel [13], and when it first entered English it had the same meaning, ‘property’. From earliest times, however, it was applied specifically to livestock thought of as property. In the Middle Ages it was a wide-ranging term in animal husbandry, being used for horses, sheep, pigs, and even poultry and bees, as well as cows, and such usages survived dialectally until comparatively recently, but from the mid 16th century onwards there is increasing evidence of the word’s being restricted solely to cows. Its ultimate source is medieval Latin capitāleproperty’, which came to English via Old French chatel as chattel and via Anglo-Norman catel as cattle. Capitāle itself goes back to classical Latin capitālis (from caputhead’), from which English gets capital.
\ \ Cf.CAPITAL, CHATTEL

Word origins - 2ed. . 2005.

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  • Cattle — Cat tle (k[a^]t t l), n. pl. [OE. calet, chatel, goods, property, OF. catel, chatel, LL. captale, capitale, goods, property, esp. cattle, fr. L. capitals relating to the head, chief; because in early ages beasts constituted the chief part of a… …   The Collaborative International Dictionary of English

  • CATTLE —    Cattle had been reared since the Neolithic in central Italy, although it has recently been suggested by geneticists that some of the white cattle distinctive of northern Etruria today may have had a more recent eastern Mediterranean origin.… …   Historical Dictionary of the Etruscans

  • cattle — mid 13c., from Anglo Fr. catel property (O.N.Fr. catel, O.Fr. chatel), from M.L. capitale property, stock, neuter of Latin adj. capitalis principal, chief, from caput head (gen. capitis; see HEAD (Cf. head)). Cf. sense development of FEE …   Etymology dictionary

  • cattle — [n] bovine animals beasts, bovid mammals, bulls, calves, cows, dogies*, herd, livestock, longhorn*, moo cows*, oxen, shorthorns, stock, strays; concept 394 …   New thesaurus

  • cattle — ► PLURAL NOUN ▪ large ruminant animals with horns and cloven hoofs, domesticated for meat or milk or as beasts of burden; cows and oxen. ORIGIN Old French chatel chattel …   English terms dictionary

  • cattle — [kat′ l] pl.n. [ME & Anglo Fr catel (OFr chatel) < ML captale, property, stock < L capitalis, principal, chief < caput, HEAD: orig. sense in var. CHATTEL] 1. Archaic farm animals collectively; livestock 2. domesticated oxen collectively; …   English World dictionary

  • Cattle — Cow redirects here. For other uses, see Cow (disambiguation). For other uses, see Cattle (disambiguation). Cattle …   Wikipedia

  • cattle — n. 1) to breed; raise (esp. AE), rear (BE) cattle 2) to drive; graze; round up cattle 3) to brand cattle 4) dairy; prize cattle 5) cattle graze 6) a head of cattle; a herd of cattle 7) young cattle are calves 8) female cattle are cows 9) male… …   Combinatory dictionary

  • CATTLE — The domestication of cattle began in prehistoric times. Ancient Sumerian inscriptions refer to the raising of cattle, and from the third millennium B.C.E. they are depicted in Egyptian, Assyrian, and Babylonian drawings as used for plowing (see… …   Encyclopedia of Judaism

  • cattle — cattleless, adj. /kat l/, n. (used with a pl. v.) 1. bovine animals, esp. domesticated members of the genus Bos. 2. Bib. such animals together with other domesticated quadrupeds, as horses, swine, etc. 3. Disparaging. human beings. [1175 1225; ME …   Universalium

  • cattle — noun ADJECTIVE ▪ beef, dairy ▪ Highland, longhorn, shorthorn ▪ native ▪ wild ▪ …   Collocations dictionary

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