claim: "Covfefe" means something, anything.
origin: On 31 May 2017 President Trump send a late-night tweet that began with a complaint about his press coverage and ended with the non-word â€œcovfefe,â€ baffling many. While â€œcovfefeâ€ jokes proliferated, some began speculating that Trump had not accidentally flubbed the word â€œcoverage,â€ but instead had been speaking either inÂ code or Arabic.Â < The #covfefe plot thickens: according to Google Translate, â€œCov feâ€™feâ€ means Ø³ÙˆÙ ÙÙ‚Ù â€œI will stand upâ€ in Arabic. https://t.co/IhIUqQkc4u â€” Covfefe David Miles (@chrisdavidmiles) June 1, 2017 > However, Google Translate brings up nothing at all forÂ Â â€œcovfefeâ€ in Arabic. Only by turning it into two words and adding an apostrophe â€”Â cov feâ€™fe â€” one can create a phrase that Google Translate says means â€œI will stand up.â€Â Thatâ€™s a bit of a stretch â€” and itâ€™s not even correct, Rasha Sharif, a linguist and language instructorÂ at the DC-based International Center for Language Studies said. Sharif, who is fluent in multiple Arabic dialects, told us by email, â€œNo, the word has nothing to do with the Arabic language.â€Â In fact, Arabic does not use a â€œVâ€ sound, which already rulesÂ out covfefe or cov feâ€™fe as a word. Sharif says that she does not trust Google Translate, because anyone can edit the translations. â€œI found many words translated wrong in the Language tools,â€ she said. So how do you say â€œI will stand upâ€ in Arabic?Â The nearest translation of the phrase isÂ sa aqif orÂ Ø³Ø£Ù‚Ù, Sharif told us.Â Â Variations:Â A separate rumor, this one published byÂ The Marshall Report,Â held: < Covfefeâ€™ (pronounced â€œcuv â€“ fee- faeâ€) is an Antediluvian term for â€œIn the end we win.â€ It was commonly used by the sons of Adam to rail against the evil actions of the fallen who had led man astray. The term gained popularity prior to the great deluge and was rarely used after the flood subsided. It regained favor around the time Nimrod was building his tower, after which it was entirely lost in translation at Babel. > The term â€œantediluvianâ€ does not refer to a language, but a Biblical time period before the Flood. Needless to say, the writer, Dianne Marshall offered no proof for herÂ claim. (The Marshall Report frequently uses â€œsatiricalâ€ and fake articles as the bases for its posts.) Another rumor, posted to Facebook by oneÂ commenter and printed by the web site Godlike Productions held that word came from a Yiddish folktale about a rare butterfly:Â < A few people have asked me about Presidentâ€™s Trumpâ€™s tweet in which he used the word â€œcovfefe.â€ Most people think he meant to write â€œcoverageâ€ and they have had quite a bit of fun with it, but actually it is a real word of Yiddish origin, meaning â€œa futile searchâ€ or â€œa pointless and false quest.â€ It was originally transliterated from the Hebrew as â€œkabfefe,â€ whose etymology is â€œkabâ€â€”relating to the mystical Qabalahâ€”and â€œfefe,â€ which is a word for â€œbutterfly.â€ What Trump was actually saying in Yiddish tweet-speak was, â€œWe are doing great things despite the pressâ€™s negative and pointless search, aka fake news.â€ For those who are interested, the idea of â€œcovfefeâ€ comes from an old Yiddish tale about a foolish Sephardi rabbi who believed he was called to find and destroy the mythical and rare butterfly known as Benshariza, or â€œLucifer butterflyâ€â€”a name that comes from â€œHelel ben Shahar,â€ meaning â€œshining starâ€ (see Isaiah 14:12; also see Ephesians 2:2, where Satan is called the â€œprince of the power of the airâ€). The rabbi claimed that the Benshariza was recognizable by a unique and disturbing pattern on its huge wings, which looked like the moon and star symbol of the god Baâ€™al-Hadad. He was convinced that this ominous creature housed â€œthe spirit of Satanâ€ and that if he could destroy it, he would free the world of evil. > We contacted Ben Kaplan, the Education Administrator at theÂ YIVO Institute for Jewish Research, who told us by email, after consulting with colleagues:Â < The Yiddish language and literature scholars at the YIVO Institute confirm that â€œcovfefeâ€ is not a Yiddish word. Â (However, an anonymous source warns against whispering it three times in the dark, in a mirror, during a full moon.) > Isaac L. Bleaman, a PhD candidate and Yiddish scholar at New York Universityâ€™s Linguistics Department added:Â < It is obviously a typo for â€œcoverage.â€ I see no clear (or even unclear) connection to Yiddish. As for the legend cited, if you Google the string â€œkabfefeâ€ there are only 45 results and all are either typos, or related to the covfefe incident. Nothing found in Google Books. So chances are it was made up. The only Yiddish word â€œcovfefeâ€ brings to mind is kopveytikÂ â€˜headache,â€™ but that would not make sense in the context of the tweet, and it is not an especially common borrowing into Jewish English. So Trump probably has never heard the word, and certainly wouldnâ€™t use it in his English. We know from Trumpâ€™s use of â€œschlongedâ€ in 2015 (a verb that he took from the Jewish English word for â€˜penisâ€™ that ultimately derives from the Yiddish noun shlangÂ â€˜snakeâ€™) that his use of Yiddish borrowings can be rather idiosyncratic. But I donâ€™t think this is one of those Yiddishisms.Â Iâ€™d sooner look for a Russian connection. > â€œCovfefeâ€ is not a word, nor is it a Nazi, Israeli, or any other type of acronym. It has no meaning. The President clearly mistyped a tweet, which he later deleted.