A famous quote of William Shakespeare “A rose is a rose by any other name� could have also been changed to “A chocolate is a chocolate by any other name�. Indeed to the connoisseur of chocolate it doesn’t matter whether the heavenly substance is called chocolate or by any other name. For the chocaholic it is the taste that matters. However, there are others who are interested in how chocolate got its name. There are many stories as to how the name chocolate came about. For something that has existed for centuries it is not a surprise that there are so many stories associated with its name.

According to the Merriam Webster dictionary and many other sources for that matter, the word is derived from the Nahuatl language. This was the language spoken by the Aztecs. So, according to this source chocolate is derived from the word chocolatl. But, others beg to differ. According to some there was no such word in any language ancient or not. This word was coined by the Spaniards by taking the Maya word chocol and replacing the Maya word for water with the Aztec word atl. In yet another story the word is supposed to be derived from Maya word chokola’j which is to drink chocolate together.

Another interesting story goes that chocolate was coined because of a misprint. The word chocolatl was miswritten as chocolat′e from which the English removed the accent and the French removed the ‘e’.

You decide which source is reliable or true.

tags: chocolate, chocoholic, aztec, mayan, French, chocolatl, William Shakespeare, chokola’j

Next in series