Broccoli is an Italian plural that English treats as a singular, like graffiti, confetti and spaghetti. The Italian singular is broccolo, "a cabbage sprout," a diminutive of brocco, "shoot, protruding tooth, small nail," from Latin broccus. So broccoli means, strictly, "little sprouts" — plural. English took the plural form because that is how the vegetable arrives, in a bunch, and has quietly ignored the grammar ever since.
The word came in during the 1650s as a frankly Italian word in English, and the plant stayed rare in England well into the 1700s, grown mostly as an ornamental. English tried other names for it — Italian cabbage in 1797, Italian asparagus back in 1735 — and sometimes confused it with cauliflower. That the Italian name won is typical: English kept the donor language's word for foods it met late.
broccoli (n.) also brocculi, brocola ; variety of common cabbage with a dense, edible head, 1650s as an Italian word in English (1590s in Italian-English dictionaries, defined "sprouts or tops of coleworts") from Italian broccoli , plural of broccolo "a sprout, cabbage sprout," diminutive of brocco "shoot, protruding tooth, small nail," from Latin broccus (see broach (n.)). The plant was rare in England before 18c. and regarded as primarily ornamental until late in the century. Other English names for it were Italian cabbage (1797) and Italian asparagus (1735) and it was sometimes conflated with cauliflower . also from 1650s
broccoli came in through Later and wider borrowings, and its spelling follows that family's conventions.
What gives it away on the page
| -o/-a/-i endings, gh for hard g, cc | Italian — music, food, and architecture.piano, opera, graffiti, spaghetti, ghetto, broccoli, balcony |
Later and wider borrowings in the spelling guide · guess another word's family