Couteau

Part of speech: noun

Definitions

1. A handheld tool featuring a sharp blade, typically used for cutting, slicing, or so forth
2. A versatile instrument commonly employed in cooking and food preparation tasks
3. A weapon characterized by a sharp edge or point, designed for stabbing or slashing

Etymology: The French "couteau" comes from Latin "cultellus", a diminutive of "culter", meaning "knife" or "ploughshare." The Latin word was itself a diminutive-based form, so the blade has been a small, sharp cutting instrument in the language for a very long time. The Latin root also gave English a surprising relative: "cuttle," as in the cuttlefish, which is a doublet of this word. Doublets are pairs of words that descend from the same source but reached English by different routes, and "cuttle" is a good example. The Old English form that gave rise to the modern word was a sharp, cutting sense that became attached to the cuttlefish's sharp-edged or cutting appearance and to its ink-filled shell, which was used as a writing tool. The two words share an ancestor but went their separate ways, one through French into the kitchen and one into the sea.

Synonyms: knife, blade, cutlery