means A rounded container, typically deep, used for cooking, storing, or holding things — and by extension the money staked in gambling or pooled for a shared purpose.

from From Old English 'pott,' a word shared widely across the Germanic and Romance languages — Old French 'pot,' Medieval Latin 'pottus' — which makes its ultimate source murky, since everyone seems to have borrowed it from everyone else. The cooking-vessel sense is ancient; the gambling 'pot' (the heap of stakes on the table) emerged much later by obvious analogy — the container that holds the winnings. The slang sense meaning cannabis is a separate, 20th-century arrival, likely a clipping of the Mexican Spanish 'potiguaya,' and unrelated to the kitchenware.