Supper is a name for the evening meal in some dialects of English. While often used interchangeably with "dinner" today, supper was traditionally a separate meal. "Dinner" traditionally had been used to refer to the main and most formal meal of the day, which, from the Middle Ages until the 18th century, was most often the midday meal. When the evening meal became the main meal, it was referred to as "dinner", and the lighter midday meal was called "luncheon."
The term is derived from the French souper, which is still used for this meal in Canadian French, Swiss French and sometimes in Belgian French. It is related to soup. It is also related to the German word for soup, Suppe. (The Oxford English Dictionary, however, suggests that the root, sup, retains obscure origins).
Read more about Supper: Various Usages
Famous quotes containing the word supper:
“People think that if a man has undergone any hardship, he should have a reward; but for my part, if I have done the hardest possible day’s work, and then come to sit down in a corner and eat my supper comfortably—why, then I don’t think I deserve any reward for my hard day’s work—for am I not now at peace? Is not my supper good?”
—Herman Melville (1819–1891)
“When I was your age I went to bed right after supper. Sometimes I went to bed before supper. Sometimes I went without supper and didn’t go to bed at all.”
—S.J. Perelman, U.S. screenwriter, Bert Kalmar, Harry Ruby, and Norman Z. McLeod. Groucho Marx, Horsefeathers, a wisecrack made to his son Frank (Zeppo Marx)