Forms: 5 confeit, -fyt, -fet, 5–6 -fite, 5–8 -fit, 6 -fitte, comfet(te, -fyte, -fytt, 6–7 -fitt(e, -fite, 6–8 cumfit, 7 -fitt, comfect, 6– comfit. [ME. confyt, a. OF. confit, confite:—L. confectum, confecta, sb. uses of confectus, -a, -um, pa. pple. of conficĕre to prepare, make ready (f. com- together + facĕre to make), whence F. confire to preserve, pickle, etc. (Cf. CONFECT.) The change of con- to com-, before f, is English.]

1

  1.  A sweetmeat made of some fruit, root, etc., preserved with sugar; now usually a small round or oval mass of sugar enclosing a caraway seed, almond, etc.; a sugar-plum.

2

1334–5.  Bursar’s Acc. (Merton College Rec. MS.). Gingebr’ confit dim. lib. viid.

3

c. 1450.  Voc., in Wr.-Wülcker, 574/36. Confectio, confyt.

4

1474.  Caxton, Chesse, III. v. G vj. They that make confeccions and confites and medecynes.

5

1547.  Boorde, Introd. Knowl., 161. They wyll eate magots as fast as we wyll eate comfets.

6

1586.  Cogan, Haven Health, xxvi. (1612), 43. Coriander cumfits.

7

1598.  Shaks., Merry W., V. v. 22. Let it … haile kissing Comfits.

8

1694.  Westmacott, Script. Hebr., 5. Condited Almonds, vulgarly called Almond Comfits.

9

1828.  Scott, F. M. Perth, viii. Wine is drunk, comfits are eaten, and the gift is forgotten when the flavour is past away.

10

1852.  R. S. Surtees, Sponge’s Sp. Tour, lvii. 324. [He] distributed … comfits to the rest of the juvenile party.

11

  † b.  Hence, In comfit. Obs.

12

c. 1430.  Two Cookery-bks., 8. Take red anys in comfyte. Ibid., 34. Brawn in comfyte.

13

c. 1460.  J. Russell, Bk. Nurture, 714, in Babees Bk., 166. With carawey in confite.

14

  † c.  pl. Liquid or syrupy ‘preserves’; jelly. Obs. rare.

15

1725.  Bradley, Fam. Dict., sv. Pears, Do not take the Pan off the Fire, till such time as you judge the Fruit [Pears] done enough … then take the Pan off the Fire, and put your Comfits into some Earthen Vessel. Ibid., s.v. Syrup, They do not make liquid Comfits of Violets.

16

  2.  Comb., as comfit-cake, -maker.

17

1594.  Plat, Jewell-ho., III. 55. Such as the Confit-makers vse to put their confites in.

18

1596.  Shaks., 1 Hen. IV., III. i. 253.

19

1600.  Lett., in Harington Nugæ Ant., 122. To eat two morsels of rich comfit cake.

20

1631.  Dekker, Match me in Lond., I. Wks. 1873, IV. 137. A Comfitmaker with rotten teeth.

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