[Sca-cooks] Butter? Lard? Tallow?

[lilinah at earthlink.net]

Lady Brighid ni Chiarain wrote:
>I consulted two of the oldest Spanish 
>dictionaries: Covarrubias' 1611 "Tesoro de la 
>Lengua Castellana o EspaÒola" and the 1734 
>edition of the RAE dictionary.  They both agree 
>that the primary meaning of "manteca" is animal 
>fat, especially the fat of suckling pigs.  The 
>word "manteca" by itself, with no qualifier, is 
>assumed to be pork lard.  The term "sebo" 
>(tallow) also appears in Covarrubias.
>
>The secondary meaning of "manteca" is butter. 
>Covarrubias says that "manteca de ganado" is the 
>fat of the milk from cattle.  "Ganado" is a term 
>that can encompass sheep and goats as well as 
>cows.  The RAE says that by extension, the term 
>also refers to the "butter" of almond mik and of 
>cocoa.

Thank you for the interesting and erudite answer. But i'm still not clear...

Does "manteca de vaca" mean butter or tallow or 
some other form of fat from a cow?

Anahita