anchovy

Wikispecies

From Spanish anchoa, from Genoese Ligurian anciôa or related Corsican anchjuva, anciua. The term's ultimate origin is unclear; some suggest it may have derived from an unattested Vulgar Latin term *apiuva, from Latin aphyē, apua, from Ancient Greek ἀφύη (aphúē) (which may be formed like Sanskrit अभ्व (ábhva-, “monster”));^[1] others suggest it comes from Basque antxu, anchu (“dried fish”), from anchuva (“dry”),^[2] if that Basque term is not itself derived from Latin via some intermediary.^[3] None of these hypotheses is satisfactory because of the phonetic irregularities.

• (UK) IPA^(key): /ˈæn.t͡ʃə.vi/, /ˈæn.t͡ʃəʊ.vi/, /ænˈt͡ʃəʊ.vi/
• (General American) IPA^(key): /ˈænt͡ʃoʊ.vi/

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• Rhymes: -əʊvi

anchovy (plural anchovies)

2. Any small saltwater fish of the Engraulidae family, consisting of 160 species in sixteen genera, of which the genus Engraulis is widely sold as food.

   Hypernym: fish

   Coordinate term: sardine

   • 1936, Norman Lindsay, The Flyaway Highway, Sydney: Angus and Robertson, page 40:

     [T]he cooks were laying a refection before him of sack and anchovies and garlic sausage and gammons of bacon and - this was the important item - a great pudding dish out of which rose the noble dome of a crisp brown pie-crust.