coffee
English
Alternative forms
Etymology
From Dutch koffie (“coffee”), from Italian caffè (“coffee”), from Ottoman Turkish قهوه (kahve, “coffee”), from Arabic قَهْوَة (qahwa, “coffee, a brew”).[1][2] The Arabic word originally referred to wine, a drink which was traditionally mixed and served hot in a similar manner. In Arabic "to brew" utilizes the same triliteral root as wine and intoxicant; see خ م ر (ḵ-m-r) "to cover over", presumably with hot water. Other sources instead claim it traces back to the name of the Kaffa region of Ethiopia, which is an Omotic word. Doublet of café and caffè and cognate with the words for "coffee" in other major European languages, most of which are derived from the Turkish and Italian words.[2]
Pronunciation
- Lua error in Module:parameters at line 290: Parameter 1 should be a valid language or etymology language code; the value "RP" is not valid. See WT:LOL and WT:LOL/E. IPA(key): /ˈkɒ.fi/
- Lua error in Module:parameters at line 290: Parameter 1 should be a valid language or etymology language code; the value "Conservative RP" is not valid. See WT:LOL and WT:LOL/E. IPA(key): /ˈkɔː.fɪ/
- Lua error in Module:parameters at line 290: Parameter 1 should be a valid language or etymology language code; the value "GA" is not valid. See WT:LOL and WT:LOL/E. IPA(key): /ˈkɔ.fi/
- Lua error in Module:parameters at line 290: Parameter 1 should be a valid language or etymology language code; the value "cot-caught" is not valid. See WT:LOL and WT:LOL/E. IPA(key): /ˈkɑ.fi/
- Homophone: coughy
- Rhymes: -ɒfi, -ɔːfi
Audio (UK): (file) Audio (US): (file) - Hyphenation: cof‧fee
Noun
coffee (countable and uncountable, plural coffees) [from 1598] [2]
- (uncountable) A beverage made by infusing the beans of the coffee plant in hot water.
- 1621, Democritus Junior [pseudonym; Robert Burton], The Anatomy of Melancholy, […], Oxford, Oxfordshire: […] John Lichfield and Iames Short, for Henry Cripps, →OCLC, partition II, section 5, member 1, subsection v:
- The Turks have a drink called coffa (for they use no wine), so named of a berry as black as soot, and as bitter […], which they sip still of, and sup as warm as they can suffer […].
- 1907 August, Robert W[illiam] Chambers, chapter IV, in The Younger Set, New York, N.Y.: D. Appleton & Company, →OCLC:
- "He was here," observed Drina composedly, "and father was angry with him." ¶ "What?" exclaimed Eileen. "When?" ¶ "This morning, before father went downtown." ¶ Both Selwyn and Lansing cut in coolly, dismissing the matter with a careless word or two; and coffee was served—cambric tea in Drina's case.
- 2013 June 22, “T time”, in The Economist, volume 407, number 8841, page 68:
- […] a new study of how Starbucks has largely avoided paying tax in Britain […] shows that current tax rules make it easy for all sorts of firms to generate […] “stateless income”: […]. In Starbucks’s case, the firm has in effect turned the process of making an expensive cup of coffee into intellectual property.
- (countable) A serving of this beverage.
- 2008, Agnes Poirier, The Guardian, 12 April:
- As I sip a coffee at Brasserie Balzar, two well-known intellectuals, one publisher and a Sorbonne professor were discussing Sarkozy's future: "He won't finish his mandate" says one.
- 2008, Agnes Poirier, The Guardian, 12 April:
- The seeds of the plant used to make coffee, misnamed ‘beans’ due to their shape.
- The powder made by roasting and grinding the seeds.
- A tropical plant of the genus Coffea.
- A pale brown colour, like that of milk coffee.
- coffee:
- The end of a meal, when coffee is served.
- He did not stay for coffee.
Synonyms
Derived terms
- black coffee
- coffee and cake
- coffee bag
- coffee bar
- coffee bean
- coffee break
- coffee cake
- coffee cup
- coffee essence
- coffee grinder
- coffeehouse
- coffee klatch
- coffee machine
- coffee maker
- coffee mill
- coffee morning
- coffee pod
- coffee pot
- coffee room
- coffee royal
- coffee rust
- coffee senna
- coffee shop
- coffee spoon
- coffee table
- coffee table book
- coffee talk
- coffeetini
- coffee tree
- dalgona coffee
- drip coffee
- filter coffee
- Gaelic coffee
- iced coffee
- instant coffee
- Irish coffee
- Kentucky coffee tree
- that and a nickel will buy you a cup of coffee
- Turkish coffee
- wake up and smell the coffee
Related terms
Descendants
- Tok Pisin: kopi
- → Burmese: ကော်ဖီ (kauhpi)
- → Rawang: gopi
- → Mon: ကဝ်ဖှဳ
- → Gujarati: કૉફી (kŏphī)
- → Hausa: kṑfī
- → Hindi: कॉफ़ी (kŏfī), काफ़ी (kāfī), कोफ़ी (kofī); कॉफी (kŏphī), काफी (kāphī), कोफी (kophī)
- → Sanskrit: काफी (kāphī)
- → Korean: 커피 (keopi)
- → Maia: kopi
- → Marathi: काफी (kāphī)
- → Marshallese: ko̧pe
- → Navajo: gohwééh
- → Scottish Gaelic: cofaidh
- → Welsh: coffi
Translations
Adjective
coffee (not comparable)
- Of a pale brown colour, like that of milk coffee.
- Of a table: a small, low table suitable for people in lounge seating to put coffee cups on.
Translations
Verb
coffee (third-person singular simple present coffees, present participle coffeeing or coffee-ing, simple past and past participle coffeed or coffee-ed)
- (intransitive) To drink coffee.
- 1839, Thomas Chandler Haliburton, The Clockmaker:
- I rushed into my cabin, coffeed, wined, and went to bed sobbing.
- 1956 January 24, Journal of François Mignon, page 7794:
- I coffee-ed with your girl friend this morning, her daughter having long since gone to town to make some final arrangements about a Catholic Daughters' frolic for tonight.
- 1969, Western Fisheries, page 51:
- A while back while coffee-ing with friends, the men were discussing new water tanks, the different makes, costs, etc.
- 1976, William Goldman, Magic, New York, N.Y.: Delacorte Press, →ISBN, page 10:
- “Can I at least make you some coffee?” “I’m not in the habit of coffee-ing with strange women.”
- 1982, Daisy Hepburn, “The Farmer”, in Lead, Follow Or Get Out of the Way!, Ventura, Calif.: Regal Books, page 98:
- While watching television or coffee-ing with a neighbor tape all your wonderful stuff onto 8½-by-11-inch sheets of paper.
- 2002, Rachel Cohn, Gingerbread, Simon & Schuster Books for Young Readers, →ISBN, pages 64–65:
- “At least my parents stick around!” I said back as I paced. I instantly regretted my comeback but that’s the thing about unkind words: You can try to undo the damage, but (a) it’s hard when you’re all coffee-ed up, and (b) you can’t take it back, ever.
- 2005, Larry Baker, Athens, America, First Coast Books, →ISBN, page 252:
- They had been at the HyVee deli that night, coffee’ed up and continuing a late night discussion of angels on the heads of pins, or whatever Episcopalians discuss, three wise men who had walked out of the HyVee to enjoy the warm September air, […].
- 2010, Jeff Collignon, The Glass Eye of Hell, →ISBN, page 160:
- Stopped at a 7/eleven, coffee-ed up, washed down four dex, hit the Interstate.
- 2010, Patrick Day, Too Late in the Afternoon: One Man's Triumph Over Depression:
- It was exactly 11 a.m. We had been coffeeing for one hour, and our coffee cups were empty.
- 2010, N.S. David, TLC (Tranquility Logistics Corporation), AuthorHouse, →ISBN, page 31:
- Very little was spoken as they coffee-ed up and she cut the peppers.
- 2011, Terrence Douglas, “Dead Princess”, in Does a Footstep Linger?, Bloomington, Ind.: iUniverse, Inc., →ISBN, page 55:
- Woke to Ravel’s Pavane For Dead Princess, / Coffee-ed with Simone’s I Get Along Without You Very Well – of course I do.
- 2013, Kat Meads, 2:12 a.m., Nacogdoches, Tex.: Stephen F. Austin State University Press, page 65:
- I, myself, have been awake since three, dressed since four, coffee-ed up since five.
- 2013, Johnny D. Boggs, Hard Winter: A Western Story, Skyhorse Publishing:
- Well, one morning after I had coffee-ed up and went to fork hay into the corrals, I spied a rider.
- 2016, Doug Jordan, The Maxim Chronicles: A Year with a Champion Poodle, AFS Publishing, →ISBN, page 181:
- Madelyn was awake around 6:30 but she was only six months old and had not yet developed pre-Christmas excitement; Michael got her changed and bottled up (and himself coffee-ed up) well before anybody else stirred.
- 2020, Rebecca Crowley, Off the Record (The London Phoenix Series), Tule Publishing, →ISBN:
- “[…] The two of you should get together for coffee one of these days. I’ll introduce you after the service.” “Sure, Gran,” Sophie said easily, well used to these monthly matchmaking efforts. Ealing was in fact rather far, and frankly she had no intention of coffee-ing with Mark Bloom either way, but she’d long learned it was best just to nod along with her grandmother’s non-stop attempts to marry her off.
- 2021 January 28, The Jerusalem Post[1]:
- Three Ladies, Three Lattes: Still coffee-ing after all these years
See also
References
- ^ Douglas Harper (2001–2024) “coffee”, in Online Etymology Dictionary.
- ↑ 2.0 2.1 2.2 “coffee, n.”, in OED Online
, Oxford, Oxfordshire: Oxford University Press, June 2021.
Further reading
- English terms borrowed from Dutch
- English terms derived from Dutch
- English terms derived from Italian
- English terms derived from Ottoman Turkish
- English terms derived from Arabic
- English terms derived from Omotic languages
- English doublets
- English terms derived from the Arabic root ق ه ي
- English 2-syllable words
- English terms with IPA pronunciation
- English terms with homophones
- Rhymes:English/ɒfi
- Rhymes:English/ɒfi/2 syllables
- Rhymes:English/ɔːfi
- English terms with audio links
- English lemmas
- English nouns
- English uncountable nouns
- English countable nouns
- English terms with quotations
- English terms with usage examples
- English adjectives
- English uncomparable adjectives
- English verbs
- English intransitive verbs
- en:Browns
- en:Coffee
- en:Colors
- en:Madder family plants