cubeb
/ˈkjuːbɛb/noun
cubeb is a noun meaning “A tailed pepper plant (Piper cubeba), an Indonesian plant cultivated for its berries and essential oil” (English Wiktionary, September 2026). It is spelled C-U-B-E-B, and it appears about once in every 79 million words in written English (wordfreq, 2021 data). The plural of cubeb is cubebs.
What does cubeb mean?
noun
- 1
A tailed pepper plant (Piper cubeba), an Indonesian plant cultivated for its berries and essential oil.
- 2
One of the berries of this plant, used as a condiment.
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
How do you pronounce cubeb?
- /ˈkjuːbɛb/
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract). Recordings: LL-Q1860_(eng)-Vealhurl-cubeb.wav, Wikimedia Commons (author and licence on each file's page).
Forms of cubeb
- cubebs plural
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
How common is cubeb?
Cubeb appears about once in every 79 million words in written English, the 282,993rd most frequent word form in the list.
Source: written frequency: wordfreq 3.1 (a 2021 snapshot of Wikipedia, subtitles, news, books, web text and social media).
Cubeb in Spanish, French, German and Portuguese
In the sense Piper cubeba:
| Language | Words |
|---|---|
| French | poivre à queue, cubèbe m archaically |
| German | Kubebenpfeffer |
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract). Translations are Wiktionary's, by sense; a linked word has its own PlainSpell page.
Where does cubeb come from?
From Middle English quibibe, from Old French quibibe, cubebe, from Arabic كُبَابَة (kubāba). The current form is remodelled after modern French cubèbe.
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).