word_origin Q Copacetic, meaning "excellent, first-rate," is such a grandly rich word! Statements like "Our love is, yes, copacetic." when spoken well, even if only fictitious, are very delicious, and give me goose bumps. Perhaps surprisingly we know very little about the origin of "copacetic". Perhaps not surprisingly, as many rich words are invented out of the blue and some persist into lives of their own with obscure etymologies. The possible origins of "copacetic" seem to be in Italian, the speech of southern US Blacks, the Louisiana Creole French dialect, Hebrew, or some combination of these. John O'Hara, who used the word in "Appointment in Samarra" but has not been known for etymological expertise, wrote that the word was "a Harlem and gangster corruption of an Italian word." He said "I don't know how to spell the Italian, but it's something like copacetti." O'Hara's uncertainty about how to spell the Italian is paralleled by uncertainty about how to spell "copacetic" itself. "Copacetic" has been recorded with the spellings "copasetic", "copasetty", "copesetic", "copisettic", and "kopasettee". The spelling is now more or less fixed, however, as "copacetic" or "copasetic". The Harlem connection mentioned by O'Hara would seem more likely than the Italian, since "copacetic" was used by Black jazz musicians and is said to have been US Southern slang in the late 19th century. If "copacetic" is Creole French in origin, it would also have a US Southern homeland. According to this explanation, "copacetic" came from the Creole French word "coupersètique", which meant "able to be coped with", "able to cope with anything and everything", "in good form", and also "having a healthy appetite or passion for life or love". Those who support the Hebrew or Yiddish origin of "copacetic" do not necessarily deny the word's US Southern connections. One explanation has it that Jewish storekeepers used the Hebrew phrase "kol b µÌedeq", meaning "all with justice", when asked if things were going okay. The idea is that Black children who were in the stores as customers or employees heard and repeated this phrase as "copacetic". No explanation of the origin of "copacetic," including those discussed here, has won the approval of scholars, as is clearly shown by the etymology of "copacetic" in the first volume of the Dictionary of American Regional English, published in 1985: "Etym. unknown." (adapted from the listing for "copacetic" in The American Heritage® Talking Dictionary, version 4.0, © 1995 SoftKey International Inc.) How's that for a Saturday afternoon lesson, kiddies? LOL 000930 ... Tank etymology has always interested me. when i am independently wealthy, or my parents remember that i am indeed a trust fund baby, or my real, millionare biological parents step forth, i intend to utilise my free time by studying this. so thank you mr. q, for the lovely lesson! 001001 ... . . 050102 ... m21k Egg and Sperm 050103 ... i.e. 0 & 1... 050103 what's it to you? who go blather from