Other forms: suppers
Supper is a light evening meal, often late. Have supper, a late supper, supper time.
In British usage it is the lighter meal eaten after dinner or instead of it, and which of dinner, tea and supper means the evening meal varies by region and by class more reliably than almost any other word in English. The Last Supper is the biblical meal. Note that supper comes from the same word as soup, since it was originally sopped bread.
1nounsupperA light evening meal, often late.
“Supper is about nine o'clock in that house.”
Patternhave supper · supper time · a light / late supper · stay for supper · after supper
supper is a meal.
sUPper → eat it, then go UP to bed
A small late meal at ten o'clock, bread and cheese at the kitchen table, and then straight up to bed: supper.
Old French soper comes from sope, soup, itself from a Germanic word for sopped bread. Supper and soup are the same word, and supper was what you sopped.
Old French
soper
Middle English
soper
English, today
supper
Built from
From Middle English soper, from Old French soper, from sope (“soup”). Compare French souper.
Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA