Yup... In fact you may hear "la pica de la cuina" or "la pica del lavabo" and, as many terms that are referred to masonry, we use the Catalan words in the Spanish we speak here (ok, this is techically plumbing, but we'll include this here)
It never occurred to me, but you're absolutely right. It goes back to Latin aquarium; from the same root (i.e. aquarius) comes aquaria, which underlies aiguière and its English equivalent ewer as well as Catalan aigüera.
It probably wouldn't have to me, either, if I hadn't seen the catalan aigüera close by and if I hadn't seen forms with -v- in Romansh (ova, ava) for "water".
But "aquarium", huh? I don't think I'd have come up with that, but now that you mention it, I can see it.
According to Lewis, the original meaning was "a watering place for cattle". The modern use of the term dates back only to 1854; it seems to have been coined afresh by analogy to vivarium.
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It probably wouldn't have to me, either, if I hadn't seen the catalan aigüera close by and if I hadn't seen forms with -v- in Romansh (ova, ava) for "water".
But "aquarium", huh? I don't think I'd have come up with that, but now that you mention it, I can see it.
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