Etymology of 高麗菜

Language Learning Chinese
1

I’d like to resolve a mystery over the etymology of the term used by Taiwanese for cabbage: 高麗菜
You can get more background by reading this post on my site:
princeroy.org/?p=438

I had argued that 高麗菜 was probably a loan term from Japan since Mandarin does not use 高麗菜 for cabbage, but 白菜 or 捲心菜. However, a friend of mine who is a linguist of Japanese shot that theory right out of the water; he commented that to his knowledge the Japanese don’t use 高麗菜 either.

So now I’m back to the drawing board: is it an indigeneous Taiwanese term? Any insights appreciated.

2

I can tell you that 高麗 is the Korean word “Koryo” (the origin of the name “Korea”). So 高麗菜 would be “Koryo cabbage”. Perhaps it is (or was) widely cultivated in Korea? I know they use some form of cabbage to make kimchi…

3

That part I get. The question is why does only Taiwan use this term (as far as I know)? Where does it come from, given that it does not appear to be Japanese or Mainland in origin?

4

This might answer your question above.

5

[quote=“Qiu”][quote]
高麗菜原產歐洲西部沿岸和地中海沿岸，正式名稱為甘藍菜。除了高麗菜，也有人稱它包心菜、捲心菜、洋白菜。十八世紀末傳入中國之後，地位遠不及大白菜。日本治台，引進甘藍菜，仍不得台灣民眾青睞。據說為了宣傳，日本人找來人高馬大的韓國（高麗）人，表現陽剛之美，（猛男秀？）宣稱這些韓國壯漢就是常吃甘藍菜才這麼強壯，又說常吃會有高麗蔘的食效，從此台灣人管這種菜為高麗菜。

另有一說：高麗菜和高麗人毫無關係。此菜原叫”ko-le”（古代日耳曼語）。美式餐廳有一道高麗菜切絲拌點其他配料的「沙拉」（salad）涼食生菜，名字就叫coleslaw，這個菜名的前半”cole”，就是”ko-le”，正確的念法應該是「高─麗」，不是「高麗」。“ko-le”傳進台灣，沿用洋名，讀如「高麗」，但無漢字，在書寫時，取既有的、音近的「高麗」兩個字，成為今人熟知的高麗菜。

[/quote]

This might answer your question above.[/quote]

Qiu, well done! Where did you find this?

6

sounds like a bit of a suspect explanation there, though it probably did come to mandarin through taiwanese and japanese.

7

iwebs.edirect168.com/main/html/myword/83.shtml

I happened to have read and bookmarked this page before.

:slight_smile:

8

So it could be related to the German Kohl?

9

didn’t realize that. also “col” in spanish and “kool” in dutch, which could have been (more likely than from german) paths of transmission to either japan or taiwan.

10

well, I think the base root is probably the Latin colis, but yeah, I’m thinking the Taiwanese just borrowed the Germanic word “kole” or maybe the “cole” from coleslaw. Fascinating stuff.