coffee

coffee = wine or from Kaffa 

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caffe (Italian)
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kahveh (Turkish)
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qahwah (Arabic)

The origin of coffee is debated but one thread begins in the Kaffa region in Ethiopia where the plant originated. Kaffa became qahwah in Arabic and then travelled via Turkish kahveh into Italian caffe and other European languages.

Other similar Arabic words are qahwa which means 'wine' or 'dark stuff' and comes from the word qahiya which means 'to have no appetite', so these may also be the original source.

Coffee was brought from Ethiopia to Yemen in Arabia and was grown there for export in the 1500s. One major ports in Yemen was the town of Mocha on the Red Sea which came to mean 'fine coffee'. Later it took on the meaning of coffee and chocolate. The crop became valuable enough that there was a decree against exporting live plants. Coffee houses became hugely popular throughout Europe in the 1600s, starting in Venice and then quickly spreading throughout the continent. The Portuguese began coffee plantations in Brazil to enter the market and by the mid-1800s they were growing about 40% of the world's coffee.

Café is the French and Spanish word for coffee and gives us the words for the place to get one, a cafe or a cafeteria. Capuccino comes from the an Italian word for 'hood' or 'something that covers the head' in Italian, similar origin to our word for cap and other words related to the 'head' such as capital. The drink is named after the color of the hoods worn by capuchin monks and nuns. Caffè latte or latte is simply 'milk coffee' in Italian just as café au lait is in French. Espresso comes from the Italian esprimere 'pressed out' because of the stream pressure used to prepare it. We get our words pressure, express and press from the same Latin word exprimere 'to press out'.

Related Words
-


Translated
- café French
- caffe Italian
- café Spanish
- kaffee German

References:
- OED
- http://espressocoffee.quora.com/Confusion-over-the-etymology-of-the-word-Coffee

orange

orange = orange tree 
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orange (Old French)
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pomum de orenge (Latin)
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narancia (Italian)
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naranj (Arabic)
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narang (Persian)
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naranga-s (Sanskrit)

Loss of initial n- probably due to confusion with definite article (e.g. une narange, una narancia), but perhaps influenced by French or "gold." The name of the town of Orange in France (see Orangemen) perhaps was deformed by the name of the fruit. Orange juice is attested from 1723. 

The tree's original range probably was northern India. The Persian orange, grown widely in southern Europe after its introduction in Italy 11c., was bitter; sweet oranges were brought to Europe 15c. from India by Portuguese traders and quickly displaced the bitter variety, but only Modern Greek still seems to distinguish the bitter (nerantzi) from the sweet (portokali "Portuguese") orange. Portuguese, Spanish, Arab, and Dutch sailors planted citrus trees along trade routes to prevent scurvy. On his second voyage in 1493, Christopher Columbus brought the seeds of oranges, lemons and citrons to Haiti and the Caribbean. Introduced in Florida (along with lemons) in 1513 by Spanish explorer Juan Ponce de Leon. Introduced to Hawaii 1792.

Tangerines were originally called Tangerine oranges or 'oranges from Tangiers'. Other European names refer to them as Mandarines ('Chinese official') referencing their Chinese heritage.

Related Words
- apple (pomme)

Translated
- orange French
- arancio Italian
- naranja Spanish
- orange German

peach

peach = Persian fruit 

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pesche (Old French)
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persica (Latin) peach or peach tree
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malum Persicum (Latin) Persian apple
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Persikon malon (Greek) Persian apple

Peach comes via French pesche from the Latin persica and prior to that malum Persicum Persian apple. Malum means both apple and fruit more generically, so 'Persian fruit' is an equally likely meaning (see apple or melon). The Latin name is a translation of the same Greek term Persikon malon.

Interestingly, it seems that Persikos in ancient Greek could mean both 'Persian' or 'the peach'. The peach tree is native to China but to came via Persia to Europe.

Malum cotoneum is the Latin name for the quince fruit. It comes from the Greek kudonion melon or 'apple of Cydonia'. Cydonia was the name for modern Chania in Crete, where the Greeks cultivated the fruit. From Latin in becomes melocotón in modern Spanish, mela cotogna in Italian and a more shortened quoyn in French and quince in English and quitte in German.

Related Words
- apple or melon
- marmalade 

Translated
- pêche French
- pesca Italian
- durazno Spanish
- pfirsich German

References:
- OED

nut

nut = hard seed 
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hnutu (Old English)
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khnut (Proto-Germanic)
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kneu (Indo-European)

The Latin word for nut is nux and comes from the same Indo-European root where we get our more Germanic nut. From nux we can get nuclula 'little nut' and then nucleus 'kernel' and nuclear 'like the nucleus of a cell'.

Walnut was introduced to English from Italy and Gaul (now France and Belgium) and means 'foreign nut' from the Old English wealh "foreign" + hnutu 'nut'. The term wealh is also where we get Welsh, a non-Germanic foreigner. Its Latin name was nux Gallica or 'Gaulish nut'.

Peanut was originally called a ground nut or ground pea. Portuguese traders took peanuts around the world from South America to Europe, China and Africa. Pea is a name for a whole group of legumes from Latin pisum and from Greek pison.

Coconut is from coco + nut. Coco is 'grinning face' in Spanish and Portuguese because of the face made from its three holes.

Related Words
-

Translated
- noix French
- noce Italian
- nuez Spanish
- nuss German  

apple

apple = fruit 

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æppel (Old English) any kind of fruit 

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ap(a)laz (Proto-Germanic)

The Old English word æppel meant any kind of fruit or fruit in general. It included nuts but excluded berries. It's originally from a Proto-Germanic root ap(a)laz, and the modern German is apfel. The early English word for dates was fingeræppla 'finger-fruit', bananas were appel of paradis 'fruits of paradise', cucumbers were eorþæppla 'earth fruits'. 

Similarly, the French word pomme means apple and also carries the more general meaning of 'fruit'. It comes from the Latin pomum that also means both 'apple' and 'fruit'. The French word for potato is pomme de terre 'apple of the earth' or 'fruit of the earth'. Pomona is the Roman goddess of fruit. Pomegranate comes from an early French word pome grenate from Latin pomum granatum 'apple of many seeds' or 'many grains'. The French currently use the word grenade where we get grenadine, made from pomegranate juice, and grenade for its seedy shrapnel.

The other Latin word for apple and fruit is malum. The comes from the Greek melon which also has both meanings. The Greek word for types of gourds with sweet fruit is melopepon or 'gourd-fruit' and where we get our word melon. So all three roots - pomum, melon and aeppel - all essentially meant generic fruit as much as they do apple.

Pineapple was the original term for a pine cone, referring to the 'fruit' of a pine tree. Later it was used to refer to the tropical fruit. The French word ananas and other related European words comes via Portuguese ananás from a Peruvian (Tupian or Guaraní language) word nanas.

Camomile originally means 'earth apple' referring to it's apple scent. It comes via the French camemile and Latin chamomilla from Greek chamaimelon 'earth apple'. The Greek word chamai means 'on the ground' + melon 'apple'. Chamai is also where we get chameleon or 'ground lion'.

Marmalade comes via French marmelade from Portuguese marmelada for 'quince jelly'. Marmelo 'quince' is from Latin melimelum or 'sweet apple' and originally from Greek melimelon, or meli 'honey' + melon 'apple'.

Related Words

- see all of the above
- malic acid - named after the acid first isolated from apple juice but also present in other fruit

- pommel horse

Translated

- pomme French

- mela Italian

- manzana Spanish

- apfel German

sugar

sugar = gravel 

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sucre (French)
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succarum (Latin)
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sukkar (Arabic)
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shakar (Persian)
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sharkara (Sanskrit) 'gravel' or 'candied sugar'

Sugar comes from the French sucre and before that Latin succarum. Before that it was sukkar in Arabic and shakar in Persian. The Arabic word sukkar gives us the German zucker and Italian zucchero. It originates from Sanskrit sharkara where it's tied to gravel or grit because of it's texture. The ancient Greek word kroke for 'pebble' is related.

Honey was the original sweetener in Europe. Around 300 BC, Alexander the Great returned to Greece from his conquest of India with the first account of sugar cane. His Admiral Nearchos tasted the cane and noted that "Indian reeds that make honey without bees". The Arabs brought the crop to Europe around 800 when ruled Sicily and Spain. They began to cultivate sugar and within a few hundred years it became the dominant sweetener. Columbus brought cane cuttings with him on his voyage to the Americas. As the Spanish began conquer the Caribbean and South America in the 1500s, they began to grow it on large scale plantations and bring it back to Europe.

Related Words
-

Translated
- sucre French
- zucchero Italian
- azúcar Spanish
- zucker German

References:
- OED
- NordZucker

potato

potato = potato 

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patata (Spanish)
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batata (Carib or Taino) 'sweet potato'

Our word potato comes from Haiti and the word batata, the Carib or Taino name for the sweet potato. It becomes patata, in Spanish and then potato in English. We don't have any meaning beyond the name of the vegetable.

Sweet potatoes and white potatoes are brought to Europe from the Americas in the 1500s. Both the Spanish and Portuguese use this as food for their sailors and the potato quickly spreads through from port to port around the world. The white potato originates from Peru.

The French word pomme de terre is 'apple of the earth' or 'fruit of the earth' because pomme means fruit generally. Similarly, there is a Swedish word jordpäron 'earth pear'.

The German word kartoffel comes from the Italian tartufolo. This is probably from the Latin word tuber 'edible root' which became terræ tuber 'earth root' which became tartuffo, another Italian word for potato. This is also probably the root truffle 'edible fungus' which comes from the Latin tufera.

Related Words
- pomme or apple via the French word for potato, pomme de terre.
- tomato. The ending ‘o’ sound in tomato was probably added as an imitation of potato
- truffle.

Translated
- pomme de terre French
- patata Italian
- patata Spanish
- kartoffle German
- solanum tuberosum - scientific latin

References:
- OED

tomato

tomato = swelling fruit 

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tomate (Spanish)
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tomatl (Nahuati) 'swelling fruit'

The tomato comes from the Aztec's word tomama 'to swell'. It becomes tomatl, a swelling fruit, and then tomate in Spanish. The Aztec's language, Nahuati, also gives us our words avocado, cocoa and chocolate. Tomatl can also be spelled xitomatl.

The Spanish explorer Cortez conquered the Aztecs in Mexico (1521). The tomato was brought to Europe from the Americas sometime in the 1500s.

The origin of the Italian word pomodoro is different. One thread explains that many of these early tomatoes were yellow, and so we get the name pomi d'oro 'apple of gold'. The first European reference comes from an Italian herbalist (1544) who called them mala aurea 'golden apples' and remarked that that they start green and ripen to yellow.

Other threads explain this Italian word as 'love apple' from pomi + adorare, 'to adore'. In French it was similarly called pomme d'amour and the English originally referred to by this French name before adopting tomato.  was called Or pomi + de Moro 'of the Moors', from the Moors of Spain or North Africa.

Related Words
- avocado, chocolate and cocoa also come from Nahauti.
- potato. The ending ‘o’ sound in tomato was probably added as an imitation of potato
- pomi or 'apple' from the Italian word pomodoro is similar to the French pomme for 'apple'. Pomme is both cases means 'fruit' more generally, as seen in words like the French word for potato pomme de terre 'fruit of the earth'.

Translated
- tomate French
- pomodoro Italian
- tomate Spanish
- tomate German

References:
- OED
- Sam Dean, Bon Appetit