Latin 'caput' (head), from PIE *kaput- — generated 'capital,' 'captain,' 'chapter,' 'chief,' 'cattle,' and 'decapitate.'
A Latin word meaning 'head,' both literally (the body part) and figuratively (the top, chief, origin, or principal part of anything), and the ancestor of a vast family of English words relating to heads, leaders, and beginnings.
From Proto-Italic *kaput, from the Proto-Indo-European root *kaput- (also reconstructed as *kapōl), meaning 'head.' Latin caput (stem capit-) was one of the most semantically versatile nouns in the language, meaning the physical head, the life or person of a human being (as in 'capitis dēminūtiō,' loss of civil status), the top or summit of anything, the origin or source (as in 'caput flūminis,' the head of a river), and a chapter or heading. Its oblique stem capit- is the source of most English derivatives.
The words 'cattle' and 'capital' are doublets — both descend from Latin caput through different paths. In medieval Latin, 'capitāle' meant 'property, wealth' (literally 'head-count,' since livestock was counted by the head). The Norman French form gave English 'cattle' (movable property, then livestock), while the learned