La muñeca... Is it a doll or a wrist?

Question

I am curious if anyone knows the etymology of the word to explain how it is both a doll and a wrist. Thx,

This is a good research question. If you´ll provide an attempt first, per the guidelines, we will be happy to show you our research, too. - bandit51jd, Feb 15, 2013

Lo siento. No he leído las reglas. Pero estoy curioso, porque es la palabra "muñeca" significa "doll" y "wrist" en ingles. Veo que también un muñeca de nieve significa "snowman" en inglés también. Busqué las raíces en latín pero estos no es similar - tcoursey, Feb 16, 2013

Sólo debe ser una coincidencia. - tcoursey, Feb 16, 2013

Answer 1

It's both.

Just like in English where "bat" can mean a wooden stick or a night-flying mammal.

Not really what he was asking. - BigMike, Feb 15, 2013

Good analogy :) - Joydeep_Singh, Nov 22, 2014

Answer 2

I was a substitute Spanish teacher, in a community where many of the kids spoke some dialect of Spanish at home. I do not actually speak Spanish, but I have a degree in Classics, and I studied Italian and French. I was teaching them the word for "wrist" in a lesson about body parts so we could play Simon Dice - a girl said, "Señor Goya, you are so silly. Muñeca doesn't mean 'wrist' it is a doll." Well, technically the word for doll is the masculine form muñeco but since baby dolls are often female, colloquially the gender was changed. Similarly the gender of the word for dog perro changes depending on the dog's gender.?

Welcome to SpanishDict. - rac1, Nov 22, 2014