The English term “chopsticks” was probably derived from the Chinese word for quick: “chop, chop”. It was first used in English by the explorer William Dampier, who made three circumnavigations of the world between 1690 and 1715. Chopsticks was actually only one of around 80 words Dampier added to the English language. So we will hear from him again (another one of his additions is, for example, avocado).
The equivalent of a knife and fork has been used in Asia for some 3,000 years. Nowadays chopsticks tend to be disposable. China and Japan produce most chopsticks out of wood, each year 45 billion pairs are produced in China and 24 billion in Japan.
But chopsticks is also a tune played on the piano. The Celebrated Chop Waltz, a waltz written for the piano by the British composer Euphemia Allen became popular in the late 1870s.
