cafe

Pronunciation

• IPA: UK /ˈkæf.eɪ/, US /kæfˈeɪ/, /kəˈfeɪ/^[1]

Etymology

It is borrowed from French café (“coffee, coffee-house”),^[2][3][4][5] from Italian caffè (“coffee”) (see coffee),^[2][3] ultimately from Turkish kahve.^[6]

Earliest recorded meaning

A coffee-house or restaurant: 1789 in the OED and MWU;^[7][6] 1802 in Etymonline and Barnhart.^[2][3]

Semantic evolution

Coffee was introduced in Venice by 1615 and in France by the 1650s by travellers who had been to Turkey and Egypt, and the first public European café may have opened in Marseilles in 1660.^[2] The OED notes that it was strictly a French term at first.^[7] French phrases such as café au lait are from 1763,^[7] and café chantant, a café with singing, from 1854.^[7] Café society, the people who frequent fashionable restaurants and nightclubs, is from 1922.^[2] In North America a café can also be a bar or nightclub,^[8][9] and in South Africa a corner shop.^[10] British slang has the shortening caf.^[3][9]

Timeline

• 1763 – café au lait.^[7]
• 1789 – a coffee-house.^[7]
• 1854 – café chantant.^[7]
• 1922 – café society.^[2]

Modern meaning

Noun

1. A small, inexpensive restaurant or coffee bar serving light meals and drinks.
2. (North America) A bar or nightclub.
3. (South Africa) A corner shop.

Related words

• coffee
• cafeteria
• caffeine
• caff

Usage notes

It is spelled café or cafe.^[8][11]

References

1. ^ Jones, Daniel (2011), Cambridge English Pronouncing Dictionary, 18th ed., ed. Peter Roach, Jane Setter and John Esling, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press
2. ^ a b c d e f Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
3. ^ a b c d Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
4. ^ Hoad, T. F., ed. (1986), The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology, Oxford: Clarendon Press
5. ^ Pearsall, Judy, ed. (1998), The New Oxford Dictionary of English, Oxford: Clarendon Press
6. ^ a b Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
7. ^ a b c d e f g Simpson, J. A.; Weiner, E. S. C., eds. (1989), The Oxford English Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Clarendon Press
8. ^ a b Soanes, Catherine; Stevenson, Angus, eds. (2004), Concise Oxford English Dictionary, 11th ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
9. ^ a b Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
10. ^ Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins
11. ^ The Chambers Dictionary (2008), 11th ed., Edinburgh: Chambers Harrap