cater

Meanings

1. 1
   verb

   To provide what someone wants or needs, especially a particular group.

   This hotel caters to families with young children.

2. 2
   verb

   To provide food and drink for an event.

   A local company catered for the wedding.

3. 3
   noun

   A person or company that provides food for events.

   The cater arrived early to set up the buffet.

Probably ultimately from French quatre (“four”), possibly via cater (“change-ringing”), although Liberman argues for a derivation from a North Germanic prefix meaning "crooked, angled, clumsy" from which he also derives cater-cousin and, via Norse, Old Irish cittach (“left-handed, awkward”). He finds this more likely than extension of the dice and change-ringing term cater as an adverb, given the likely cognates in other Germanic languages. Caterpillar and caterwaul are unrelated, being derived from cognates to cat, but may have influenced the pronunciation of Liberman's proposed earlier *cate…

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