[a. F. candi in sucre candi; cf. It. zucchero candi (found, according to Littré, in an It. author of 1310), Sp. azucar cande, Pg. assúcar candi, med.L. saccharum candi; a. Arab., orig. Pers. qand sugar, the crystallized juice of the sugar-cane (whence Arab. qandah candy, qandī candied); of Indian origin, cf. Skr. khaṇḍa ‘piece,’ also ‘sugar in crystalline pieces,’ f. khaṇḍ to break. As in the other langs., the full SUGAR-CANDY (q.v.) appears much earlier than the simple candy.]
1. Crystallized sugar, made by repeated boiling and slow evaporation, more fully called SUGAR-CANDY; also any confection made of, or incrusted with this. (In U. S. used more widely than in Great Britain, including toffy, and the like.)
[c. 1420. Liber Cocorum, 7. With sugur candy thou may hit dowce.
1543. Traheron, trans. Vigo’s Chirurg., Interpr. Straunge Wds., A syrupe they calle sugre candie.]
1769. Mrs. Raffald, Eng. Housekpr. (1778), 241. To a pound of double refined sugar put two spoonfuls of water, skim it well, and boil it almost to a candy, when it is cold, drain your plums out of the first syrup, and put them in the thick syrup.
1808–17. Foster, in Life & Corr. (1846), I. lxxv. 410. Handing round candies and cowslip wine.
1844. Emerson, Young Amer., Wks. (Bohn), II. 302. One man buys … a land title … and makes his posterity princes; and the other buys barley candy.
1852. Mrs. Stowe, Uncle Tom’s C., I. xiv. 213. With her hands full of candy, nuts, and oranges.
1865. Mrs. Whitney, Gayworthys, II. 44. The parson … approved only of white unflavoured candies for his children.
2. Comb., as candy-stall, -store, -woman; candy-braid (U.S.), a twist of candy or toffy; candy-broad sugar (Sc.), ‘loaf or lump sugar’ (Jam.); candy-high a. or adv., to the point of candying or crystallizing; so candy-height; candy-man, an itinerant seller of candy; in the north of England, a bum-bailiff or process-server; so called because in the great strike of coal-miners in 1844, when a large number of extempore bailiffs were employed to eject the miners wholesale from the cottages, there were recognized among them some well-known sellers of ‘dandy candy’ from the Newcastle streets, whose appellation was transferred to persons employed in the unpopular office; † candy-plate, an obsolete confection (see PLATE); candy-pull (U.S.), a turn at pulling or twisting toffy to make it tough and light-colored, a party of young people at which toffy is made (in Scotland a taffy-join); candy-sugar = SUGAR-CANDY.
1870. Emerson, Soc. & Solit., Wks. vii. (Bohn), III. 64. Steam … can twist beams of iron like *candy-braids.
1732. R. Maxwell, Trans. Soc. Improv. Agric., 290 (Jam.). Three ounces of *candy-broad sugar.
1741. Compl. Fam.-Piece, I. i. 91. Boil it to a *Candy-height.
1769. Mrs. Raffald, Eng. Housekpr. (1778), 247. When it begins to candy round the edge of your pan it is candy height.
1750. E. Smith, Compl. Housewife, 200. Sugar made into a syrup, and boiled *candy-high.
1863. Newcastle Chron., 31 Oct., 3/3. The colliery carts and waggons stood at the doors, and the furniture was handed out…. It was evident that the *‘candy men’ had warmed to their work.
1880. Patterson, Antrim & Down Gloss. (E. D. S.), Candy-man, a rag-man. These men generally give a kind of toffee, called ‘candy,’ in exchange for rags, etc.
1886. Leeds Mercury, 13 Jan., 8/4. A large body of police and thirty ‘candymen’ arrived at Medoursley Collieries, Consett, near Durham, yesterday, for the purpose of evicting sixty unionists.
1649. G. Daniel, Trinarch., Hen. V., ccclxvi. Soe saue the Ipocras, and *Candy Plate.
1887. Boston (Mass.) Jrnl., 20 Aug., 5/3. The candies suggest pleasant winter evenings, and *‘candy pulls’ at the beach in summer.
1879. Sala, in Daily Tel., 26 Dec. A very grand *‘candy’ stall, overbrimming with those lollipops so irrepressibly dear to the American palate.
1884. New York Her., 27 Oct., 7/6. Girl to learn to attend bakery, lunch room or *candy store.
1864. Louie’s last Term, 168. The *candy-woman … did not make any thing of the Dough-balls any how.
¶ Candy in mod. edd. of Shaks., 1 Hen. IV., I. iii. 251: see CAUDIE.
