tsaa

From Proto-Athabaskan *tsaˑʷ. Cognate with Lower Tanana tso.

tsaa

1. cache

• Sharon Hargus; Keren Rice (2005), Athabaskan Prosody, Amsterdam: John Benjamins Publishing Company, →ISBN, page 5

Ultimately borrowed from Cantonese 茶 (caa⁴), possibly via Portuguese chá.

tsaa

1. tea

From Proto-Athabaskan *tsaʔ. Cognate with Hän tsà’, Sarcee tsxa, Navajo chaaʼ, Chipewyan tsáá, Beaver chááʼ, Sekani tsáʼ, Ahtna tsaʼ.

tsaa

1. beaver

• Young, Robert W & William Morgan, Sr. The Navajo Language. A Grammar and Colloquial Dictionary. University of New Mexico Press. Albuquerque, NM: 1987.

tsaa

1. stone

• Dieterman, Julia; McCarty, James Michael, Jr.; Castañón López, Victoriano; Castañón Eugenio, María Dolores (2018), Breve diccionario del mixe del Istmo: Mogoñé Viejo, Oaxaca (Serie de vocabularios y diccionarios indígenas “Mariano Silva y Aceves”; 52)‎^[1] (in Spanish), Instituto Lingüístico de Verano, A.C., page 65

• sa — obsolete
• cha
• tsa
• saa, chaa

Ultimately from Chinese, either through:

• Cantonese 茶 (caa⁴), possibly via Macau Portuguese chá and next via Philippine Spanish cha as recorded in Abella (1874).
• Wade–Giles romanization of Mandarin 茶 (chʻa²) according to Manuel (1948)

The sense “gossip” is a semantic loan from English tea (“information; gossip”) as in spill the tea.

The vowel was separated into two syllables through epenthesis to satisfy the older Tagalog phonological constraint that nouns be minimally disyllabic. (cf. aam, gaas, siim, tiim, etc.).

• (Standard Tagalog) IPA^(key): /t͡ʃaˈʔa/ [t͡ʃɐˈʔa]
  • IPA^(key): (no palatal assimilation) /tsaˈʔa/ [t͡sɐˈʔa]
• Rhymes: -a
• Syllabification: tsa‧a

tsaá (Baybayin spelling ᜆ᜔ᜐᜀ)

1. tea (plant, leaves, and drink)
2. (slang) tea (information, especially gossip)

   Anong tsaa, mare?

   What's the tea, girl?

   • 1943, Artemio Ricarte, Nihon to bushidō o kiku:

     Ang mga Hapones ay lubhang magiliw din sa Tsaa. Kadalasang Tsaa ang idinudulot sa kanino mang dumadalaw sa kanilang tahanan.

     The Japanese are very fond of tea as well. Tea is often being served to whomever visits their residence.

• “tsaa”, in KWF Diksiyonaryo ng Wikang Filipino, Komisyon sa Wikang Filipino, 2025
• “tsa”, in Pambansang Diksiyonaryo | Diksiyonaryo.ph, 2018
• Manuel, E. Arsenio (1948), Chinese elements in the Tagalog language: with some indication of Chinese influence on other Philippine languages and cultures and an excursion into Austronesian linguistics, Manila: Filipiniana Publications, page 65
• Serrano Laktaw, Pedro (1914), Diccionario tagálog-hispano (overall work in Tagalog and Spanish), Intramuros, Manila: Ateneo de Manila., page 1307
• Abella, Venancio María de (1874), Vade-Mecum Filipino ó manual de la conversacion familiar Español-Tagalog. Seguido de un curioso Vocabulario de Modismos Manileños., 12.ᵃ edition (overall work in Philippine Spanish and Tagalog), Escolta, Manila: Ramirez y Giraudier, á cargo de C. Miralles., page 115
• “cha”, in Diccionario de la lengua española [Dictionary of the Spanish Language] (in Spanish), online version 23.8.1, Royal Spanish Academy [Spanish: Real Academia Española], 15 December 2025

• asta, atas, saat, tasa, taas

tsaa

1. stone

• Schoenhals, Alvin; Schoenhals, Louise C. (1965), Vocabulario mixe de Totontepec: Mixe-castellano, castellano-mixe (Serie de vocabularios indígenas Mariano Silva y Aceves; 14)‎^[2] (in Spanish), México, D.F.: El Instituto Lingüístico de Verano en cooperación con la Dirección General de Asuntos Indígenas de la Secretaría de Educación Pública, page 111