cigar

pronunciation

How to pronounce cigar in British English: UK [sɪˈɡɑː(r)] word uk audio image

How to pronounce cigar in American English: US [sɪˈɡɑːr] word us audio image

Word Origin

cigar: cigar: [18] Cigar comes from Spanish cigarro, whose origin is disputed. One story, perhaps more picturesque than accurate, is that it is an adaptation of cigarra, the Spanish word for ‘cicada’; supposedly this insect, with its stout body round which are wrapped large transparent leaflike wings, was held to resemble a cigar. Others have preferred to see as the source sicar, the verb for ‘smoke’ in the language of the ancient Maya of Central America. Cigarette is a French derivative, with the diminutive suffix -ette, apparently coined in the early 1840s.

cigar (n.): 1730, from Spanish cigarro (source also of French cigare), probably from Maya sicar "to smoke rolled tobacco leaves," from si'c "tobacco;" or from or influenced by Spanish cigarra "grasshopper, cicada" (on resemblance of shape), from Vulgar Latin *cicala (source also of French cigale, Italian cigala). Cigar-box is from 1819; cigar-store from 1839; the wooden cigar-store Indian is from 1879, American English, but wooden images of feathered Indians or Negroes are mentioned outside tobacconists' shops in England by 1852, and are said to have been in earlier use on the Continent. Blackamoors and other dark-skinned foreigners have always possessed considerable attractions as signs for tobacconists, and sometimes also for public-houses. Negroes, with feathered headdresses and kilts, smoking pipes, are to be seen outside tobacco shops on the Continent, as well as in England. [Jacob Larwood and John Camden Hotten, "The History of Signboards From the Earliest Times to the Present Day," London, 1867]