beaucoup - Wiktionary, the free dictionary
From Wiktionary, the free dictionary
Borrowed from French beaucoup, early 20th century. Popularized by American GIs during the Vietnam War.
beaucoup
- (US, especially Louisiana, informal) Much, many, a lot of.
You know that cost beaucoup bucks!
1979, Gustav Hasford, The Short-Timers, New York: Bantam Books, published 1980, →ISBN, page 93:
Donlon says, "Well, we're rich and we got beaucoup beer and beaucoup chow. Now all we need is the Bob Hope show."
1987 November 2, Michael Halperin, w:Dorothy Catherine Fontana, “Lonely Among Us”, in Star Trek: The Next Generation, season 1, episode 7, spoken by Geordi La Forge (LeVar Burton), production code 108:
Then he'd have to be relieved of command. Which you could do, Doctor, but it's beaucoup trouble if you're wrong.
beaucoup (plural beaucoups)
- An abundance.
beaucoup (not comparable)
- In abundance.

Inherited from Old French biau cop, first attested circa 1210.[1] Equivalent to beau (“nice, beautiful”) + coup (“hit, strike”). The latter word also means “helping of soup or beverage”, first attested circa 1375, whose sense may have triggered or reinforced beaucoup to mean “a lot”.
beaucoup
- much, very much, a lot [with de ‘of’]
- Merci beaucoup! ― Thank you very much!
- Je mange beaucoup. ― I eat a lot.
- On connaît beaucoup de gens. ― We know a lot of people.
- (Louisiana) very
- Synonym: très
- Un beaucoup vieux homme. ― A very old man.
- Louisiana Creole: bokou, boukou
- Mauritian Creole: boukou
- → English: beaucoup, boku, boocoo, bookoo, buku
- → Nigerian Pidgin: boku
- “beaucoup”, in Trésor de la langue française informatisé [Digitized Treasury of the French Language], 2012.