Word Stories: cappuccino

April 27, 2015 10:00

Follow

Steve Taylore-Knowles looks at the stories behind the English language.

While sipping my latte in the centre of Athens recently, my mind strayed onto the origins of the names of different coffee-based drinks. Most, it seemed to me, are more or less self-explanatory. Latte is the Italian word for ‘milk’, from the Latin root word lac, which in English gives us all the lactose, lactic, lactate words. Espresso is coffee that has been ‘pressed’ or ‘expressed’. Frappe has been hit or struck (from the French frapper, to hit). But what about cappuccino?

Picture, if you will, Franciscan monks in 16th-century Italy. Founded in 1209 by St Francis of Assisi, the Franciscan order (or ‘Friars Minor’, the word ‘friar’ derived from Latin fratre, ‘brother’) was based on the principles of preaching the gospel and helping the poor while themselves remaining poor. By the early 1500s, there were two families, Conventuals (who accepted a fixed income from the Pope) and Observants (who lived off alms). One Observant, Father Matteo di Bassi, felt that even the Observants were straying from the original principles laid down by St Francis and he decided to do something about it. He took an old habit and formed the cap into a long pointed hood, similar to the style of habit worn by St Francis, and in 1528 went to Rome, where he got Pope Clement VII’s permission to wear the habit and live in strict poverty.

Thus was founded the Order of Friars Minor Capuchin, generally known as the Capuchins. The Latin cappa (cap, cape) had led to capuche, cappuccio (hood) in Italian, with the derivative cappuccino referring to the kind of cowl that these monks wore. This became capuchin in 16-century French, from whence it entered English. The name is also applied to a couple of species of animals where fur or feathers form a kind of cowl over the head – the Capuchin monkey and the Capuchin pigeon.

The coffee-with-steamed-milk drink was known as cappuccino in Italian because of the resemblance to the colour of the robes worn by the Capuchins. Eventually, the drink started to become fashionable in English-speaking parts of the world. The first use of the word cappuccino in English in writing dates from 1948.

Тема: Grammar & Vocabulary Теги: Wordstory, Etymology

0 1967 0

0

You should be signed in to comment this post.

Sign in to leave comment