[Sca-cooks] Butter? Lard? Tallow?

[lilinah at earthlink.net]

Greetings:

Our local cooking list is having a discussion of the meaning in 16th 
c. Spanish of "manteca de vaca". It was given in a recipe as 
"butter", which is how i've seen it translated. But some listees 
think it means "cow lard" and thus means "tallow".

It appears that in Modern Spanish "manteca" means butter, "tallow" is 
"sebo", and "lard" is "manteca de cerdo", but i don't assume that 
what is true today is the same as it was 400 plus years ago.

As i am not a specialist in Renaissance Spanish, could some listees 
who have dealt with Renaissance Spanish please comment?

Thanks,
Anahita