- soup (n.)
- "liquid food," 1650s, from French soupe "soup, broth," from Late Latin suppa "bread soaked in broth," from a Germanic source (cf. Middle Dutch sop "sop, broth"), from Proto-Germanic base *supp-, from PIE *sub-, from root *seue- "to take liquid" (see sup (v.2)). Primordial soup is from a concept first expressed 1929 by J.B.S. Haldane. Soup kitchen is attested from 1839. In Ireland, souper meant "Protestant clergyman seeking to make proselytes by dispensing soup in charity" (1854).
- soup (v.)
- "increase the horsepower of an engine," 1921, probably from soup (n.) in slang sense of "narcotic injected into horses to make them run faster" (1911), influenced by supercharge (v.).