Apricock

Part of speech: noun

Definitions

1. A small orange-colored stone fruit with velvety skin and a large central pit, commonly eaten fresh or dried
2. A sweet-fleshed fruit with a fuzzy golden exterior and a single hard kernel inside, related to peaches and plums
3. An orange fruit smaller than a peach, with smooth or downy skin and a hard pit at its center

Etymology: The word "apricock" is an older English spelling of "apricot," and its path into English runs through Arabic, Greek and Latin. The Arabic "al-barqūq" ("plums") gave Catalan "albercoc," and a dialectal Catalan variant, "abricoc," was borrowed into English as "abrecock." That form was then reshaped by Latin "apricum" ("sunny place"), which made it resemble a word meaning something warm and sunlit, though the fruit has nothing to do with that sense. Behind the Arabic word lies a Greek chain. Medieval Greek "berikokkía" meant "apricot tree," and Ancient Greek "praikókion" traces back to Late Latin "praecocia," from "(persica) praecocia," meaning "peaches which ripen early." The name therefore described a fruit that ripened ahead of the rest. Early English spellings like "abrecock" gave way to "apricock," which was itself altered under influence from French "abricot." The modern "apricot" won out, and "apricock" survives only as an obsolete spelling. The same Latin root "praecoquus" ("early ripening") also gave English "precocious," a doublet that shares the idea of ripening ahead of time.