14 Nov /16

Chestnut

Chestnut - Word of the day - EVS Translations
Chestnut – Word of the day – EVS Translations

Traditionally, the Halloween celebrations mark the start of winter, bleak and gloomy some may say, but as with everything else in life, the winter season is not only darkness and cold. There is always the light, it is in the glowing eyes of lanterns guiding the spirits at night or in the shy winter sun. Or better yet, if you are lucky enough, you may be treated to an authentic log fire. I bet you have already pictured the hot chocolate and marshmallows or why not some mulled wine and roasted chestnuts with Nat King Cole’s The Christmas Song in the background “Chestnuts roasting on an open fire…

And in November, the chestnut serves its role as a symbol of sustenance on the St. Martin’s Day, so just the right time to look at the word itself.

Chestnut is a word of disputable origin. In English, it was introduced from the French chastain. From there tracing the origin of the word takes us back to Latin and to the Greek kastaneia – which the Greeks thought meant ‘a nut from Castana’ in Thessaly – though most likely the place itself was named for the trees and the word adopted from a language in Asia Minor, from where the tree had spread, and following a legend that circa 400 B.C the Greek army survived on supplies on chestnuts during their retreat from the region.

Chestnuts are, indeed, super nutritious, delicious and provide minerals, vitamins and good quality protein. Yes, they are nuts, but unlike most other nuts and seeds they are relatively low in calories, have less fat and almost all of – unsaturated. Another unique thing about chestnuts is that they are composed mainly of starch – just like potatoes, plantain, sweet potatoes and corn and last, but not least, they are gluten free.

The chestnut tree was first introduced to Europe via Greece and the word entered the English language circa 700 with variable spellings, from the first mentions as cistim and castanea, through Geoffrey Chaucer’s Knight’s Tale from 1386: “chasteyn [v.r. chestayn, chesteyn, chasteine],” to the first mention of the chesten nuts in William Horman’s Vulgaria from 1519: “I have gathered chesten nuts.”

The first use of the compound word comes from 1570, from a Dictionary of Latin and English Words and a spelling of chesnutte. And the modern spelling, as we know it, follows in 1597, in William Langham’s The garden of health: “Chestnuts of all wild fruits are the best and meetest to be eaten.”

The word was firstly used as a reference to the dark reddish-brown colour in 1650, in 1832 came out the horse chestnut and the slang meaning of chestnut as a ‘venerable joke or story’ was explained by Joseph Jefferson in 1888.

The most famous chestnut tree is The Hundred Horse Chestnut, located in Sicily and generally believed to be around 3,000 years old. Taking its name from a legend that the queen of Aragon and her company of one hundred knights found shelter under the tree when caught in a severe thunderstorm during a trip to Mount Etna. The myth is plausible as two centuries later the circumference of the chestnut tree measured nearly 60 meters.