chai
/tʃaɪ/
noun
Origin
Old Chinese
茶 (chá) — tea plant or leaf
Overview
Meaning Now
- A beverage made by boiling tea leaves with various spices, aromatics, and often milk and sugar.
Literal older meaning
tea
Language path
Old Chinese → Persian → Hindi/Urdu → English
Earliest form
cha
Earliest period
17th century
Journey
The word for tea spread from China along the Silk Road. Languages that accessed tea by land routes (like Persian, Russian, and Hindi) typically use variations of 'chai', while languages that accessed it by sea (like English 'tea' or Dutch 'thee') use variations of the Min Chinese 'te'.
Evolution
- Old Chinese
茶 (chá)
“tea”
Early term for the leaves of the Camellia sinensis plant.
- Persian
چای (chāy)
“tea”
Adopted via trade routes; the 'y' suffix is a Persian addition.
- Hindi/Urdu
चाय (cāy)
“tea”
Direct borrowing from Persian.
- English
chai
“spiced tea”
Loanword adopted in the 20th century, specifically referring to 'masala chai'.
Connections
Word parts
chai
root
tea
Related across languages
Russian
чай (chay)
tea
Turkish
çay
tea
Persian
چای (chāy)
tea
Related words
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Related to chai
External references use DefinedTerm semantics.