Vichy water
- noun
- /ˈvɪʃi ˈwɔːtər/
- I always order a Vichy water when I dine at that French restaurant.
Examples
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Give me just a little glass of Vichy water.
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On a hot summer day, nothing is better than a chilled bottle of Vichy water.
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During his trip to France, he enjoyed refreshing Vichy water by the pool.
Synonyms
Water that has small amounts of minerals in it and is often fizzy
Water that comes from under the ground and is safe to drink
Water with small bubbles that make it fizzy
A French brand of sparkling mineral water sold in green bottles
How Mineral
Surface Forms
Morphology
This is a compositional place-name + noun construction: a B1 learner who knows 'Vichy' as a place or brand and 'water' will readily infer it means water associated with Vichy (i.e. water from or like that place). The pattern (place + water = water from that place, cf. 'Evian water') is cross-linguistically common, so the meaning is transparently derived from its parts even if the learner might not know the exact mineral/sparkling details.
Etymology
Vichy water comes from the town Vichy in France, where people long drank fizzy mineral springs that many thought were good for health. Because visitors and doctors called the bottled drink Vichy water, the name came to mean 'sparkling mineral water' from Vichy or any similar fizzy mineral water.