Cocktail

How to spell cocktail

8 letters · 2 syllables

How to pronounce cocktail

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does cocktail mean?

1. nounAn alcoholic drink made by mixing spirits with other ingredients such as juice, syrup or bitters.
2. nounA mixture of different substances or elements combined together.

Cocktail in a sentence

• The bartender shook a cocktail with gin, lime and a splash of soda.

• The patient was treated with a cocktail of antiviral drugs.

• Each guest received a cocktail on arrival at the reception.

• The dessert was a tropical fruit cocktail served chilled.

Where does cocktail come from?

Language of origin: Other

Cocktail is an American coinage that first appears in print in the early 1800s, with one famous 1806 newspaper definition describing it as a stimulating mix of spirits, sugar, water and bitters. The word literally joins 'cock', meaning a rooster, and 'tail', and the reason for that pairing has never been settled with certainty. Among the many proposed explanations are the practice of docking the tails of mixed-breed (not thoroughbred) horses, the colourful 'cock-tailed' look of a garnished drink, and various tavern and stable slang origins, none of which can be proven. Because the true source is genuinely murky, the word is best treated as an early American invention of obscure background. The spelling itself is mercifully transparent: it is simply the two common English words 'cock' and 'tail' written together, so the trap is remembering it is one closed word rather than two.

How the word is built

• cock (rooster)
• tail (the tail), a fixed compound whose two parts are clear but whose combined meaning is not literal