Kaffirn.adj.

Etymology: Ultimately < Arabic kāfir denier, unbeliever, non-Muslim, (in extended use) black African, use as noun of the active participle of kafara to cover up, to conceal, to deny, to be ungrateful. In early uses via forms in other European languages, although the precise route of transmission is unclear. The English word very likely shows some input from any or all of: (i) Spanish cafre non-Muslim (1521, attested earliest in the Philippines), black African (early 17th cent.); (ii) Portuguese cafre black African, non-Muslim (both 16th cent.; in the latter sense frequently with derogatory overtones); (iii) French †Kafer, †Kafier non-Muslim (both 1670 in the source translated in quot. 1671, or earlier; also kaffir , caffre ; 1685 in sense ‘member of any of the Nguni peoples of south-eastern Africa’; rare before the beginning of the 19th cent.; see note); (iv) Italian †cafero (noun) member of any of the Nguni peoples of south-eastern Africa, (adjective) of or relating to one of these peoples (1587 in the passages translated in quots. 1588 at sense A. 2aα. and 1588 at sense B. 1a, or earlier; also †caffro, now caffero or (more usually) cafro); (v) Dutch kaffer member of any of the Nguni peoples of south-eastern Africa (late 18th cent. or earlier in a southern African context in this sense; 1596 as †caffre in sense ‘black person from southern Africa’, 1641 as †caffer in sense ‘non-Muslim’; Afrikaans (now derogatory and offensive) kaffer).Although it is sometimes suggested that the Arabic noun is a loanword from either Hebrew or Aramaic (compare post-biblical Hebrew kōpēr (Babylonian Talmud, Sanhedrin), Aramaic kōpēr, both in sense ‘denier, non-believer, apostate’) it is more likely that these forms are simply cognates. With the French noun, compare also Old French cafre (13th cent. in uncertain sense, perhaps ‘leper’, or perhaps merely a general term of opprobrium), which appears to show an independent borrowing of the Arabic word in a different sense. In plural forms with -u- in the first syllable after the Arabic broken plural form kuffār.