The other day I was contacted by a friend asking what binnacle meant in ‘security binnacle’. I must say I had never heard of the word and promptly verified whether – peradventure – the word she was looking for was instead ‘pinnacle’. It did not make much sense in that context either, so I asked for more content and details about the translator, a Mexican engineer who had been asked to translate from his native Spanish into English.
Intrigued and eager to solve the mystery, I looked up binnacle in Spanish and found bitácora. However, it turns out bitácora not only means binnacle, but it also means logbook. Now ‘security logbook’ does ring less nonsensical in this phrase. Was this, perhaps, the word the Mexican engineer had in mind?
Now I’m sure you’re all dying to find out what a binnacle is in English. These pictures should help.
So where does this word hail from? According to some dictionaries: 1. “wooden box for a ship’s compass,” 1738, corruption of bittacle (1620s), which is probably from Spanish bitacula or Portuguese bitacola, both from Latin habitaculum “little dwelling place,” from habitare “to inhabit” 2. alteration of Middle English bitakle, from Old Portuguese or Old Spanish; Old Portuguese bitácola & Old Spanish bitácula, from Latin habitaculum dwelling place, from habitare to inhabit. Makes sense.
In older Italian the word for this used to be abitacolo, but it has since been replaced by chiesuola and the Spanish cuaderno de bitácora is known as giornale di chiesuola . Would this be the same as diario di bordo? Not a clue. I guess I’m all at sea when it comes to nautical terminology.
