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toque

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toque¹

  • /təʊk/ UK
  • /toʊk/ US

Rhymes with -əʊk, -oʊk

Where it comes from

From Middle French toque (“toque”), from Arabic طَاقِيَّة (ṭāqiyya).

noun toques · touque

  1. A type of hat with no brim. Toques are for the most part indented in the mural style, in two rows, between which are placed marabout feathers. Flowers, feathers, ears of corn, in gold or silver: such are the chief ornaments on the heads of young ladies, either as separate decorations or all blended together. Black velvet toque
  2. specifically A tall white hat with no brim of the sort worn by chefs. Chef Felder was in her early forties, slender, with short wavy brown hair, almost all of which could be contained within her toque.
  3. broadly, informal A chef. 2007—October, Nicole Berrie, "Green Eggs and Sam", in Elle, page 360, Sam Mason first grabbed the spotlight as the pastry chef ... for being the most rock 'n' roll toque in town.
  4. A variety of bonnet monkey; toque macaque, Macaca sinica.
  5. historical An African nominal money of account, equal to 40 cowries.

toque²

  • /tuːk/ Canada
  • /tjuːk/ Canada

Rhymes with -uːk

Where it comes from

1871. Assimilated from Canadian French tuque. Likely to be a hypercorrection from the time that toque was already in the dictionaries when they did not yet list tuque as a kind of hat. The French word tuque for hat is itself not strictly a deformation of French toque: it is also related to other meanings of tuque and to its former name bonnet à la turque (literally “Turkish-style bunnet/cap”).

noun toques · tuque

  1. Canada A knitted hat, usually conical but of varying shape, often woollen, and sometimes topped by a pom-pom or tassel. Such is the demented nature of the universe that I was too weak to properly respond to my being hit on by carloads of Betties and Veronicas—all except for the cheeky Cheryl Anderson who gave me ‘manual release’ the day I lost my eyebrows, followed by a flood of tears and the snapping of Polaroids in

    Similar: beanie, knit cap, stocking cap, watch cap

toque³

noun toques

  1. countable, uncountable A rhythm used in Latin music, especially Cuban religious rituals.
  2. countable, uncountable The guitar part of flamenco music.

Translations

Every language

noun rimless hat

Françaistoque
Русскийток tok

noun tall white hat worn by chefs

Françaistoque
DeutschKochmütze
Русскийколпа́к kolpák, поварско́й колпа́к povarskój kolpák

noun Macaca sinica

Françaistoque
Русскийцейло́нский мака́к cejlónskij makák

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Cite this
MLA

"toque." Wiktionary, via Micwyn, micwyn.com/word/toque. Accessed 6 Nov. 2026.

APA

toque. (n.d.). In Wiktionary, via Micwyn. Retrieved November 6, 2026, from https://micwyn.com/word/toque

Chicago

"toque." Wiktionary, via Micwyn. Accessed November 6, 2026. https://micwyn.com/word/toque.

BibTeX
@misc{toque_2026,
  title = {toque},
  howpublished = {Wiktionary, via Micwyn},
  year = {2026},
  url = {https://micwyn.com/word/toque},
  urldate = {2026-11-06}
}