Of course, having checked both Wiktionary and the Real Academia Española, I know that the word "anteojos" is etymologically derived from "antojo", which in turn is a combination of the Spanish words "ante" and "ojo".
However, I'm curious about exactly how the word "antojo"--which, taking its etymological constituents literally, I suppose means something like "before eye", but in terms of actual language means "whim", "craving", or "birthmark"-- might have lead to the introduction of the word "anteojos", which is really just going back to the original etymological roots of "antojo", and yet which denotes a pretty distinct concept.
I find that it makes pretty good sense for the concepts of "whim" and "craving" to be described with a word that means "before eye", as I'm assuming it has to do with the idea that such things are, in a sense, before one's eyes, beckoning to or tempting the observer. I'm a bit less certain about why it would come to describe a birthmark, though I'm guessing it has something to do with a birthmark's conspicuous visibility.
Now, the intuitive explanation for this word being slightly morphed to describe glasses/spectacles would be that they make it easier for a person to see what is before his or her eyes. That seems clear enough, at least to me. Edit: Actually, I just found an answer to an earlier question on here that I missed in my initial search, which explains that they were called such because glasses sit on the face before the eyes. Duh. My bad.
So, my first question is, am I wrong with any of my above thinking?
My second question is, how exactly does a word like "anteojo" come about? The Real Academia Española etymology box for "anteojo" says "De antojo, con recomposición etimológica." but I'm not quite sure what a so-called "etymological recomposition" is. Does that imply a sort of conscious recomposition of the etymological roots of "antojo" in order to coin a word to describe a new invention, or does it imply a more natural and incidental process that amounts to the same thing?