Why Are Police Officers Called ‘Cops’?

The theme from the TV show Cops repeatedly asks, “Whatcha gonna do when they come for you?” But curious linguists may pose an entirely different question: Where does the word “cops” come from? While it’s common to refer to the police as cops, the terms don’t seem that similar, beyond a few shared letters. But there’s one backstory that explains the entire situation, as well as a few popular, albeit untrue theories we’d like to dispel.

One oft-repeated theory is that “cop” is an acronym for “constable on patrol,” but that’s not true. Another common misconception is that it references the copper badges and buttons worn on vintage New York City police uniforms — also false. The plain reality is that “cop” is derived from the dated verb “to cop,” defined as “to seize” or “to capture,” as one might nab a criminal.

The English verb “cop” is of northern British origin, coined in the early 18th century. It may come from the French term caper, meaning “to seize,” which itself comes from the Latin capere, meaning “to take.”

The term “copper” — as in a police officer — came about in 1838, used in the February 3 edition of Cockney Adventures: “Do it at vonce, else the coppers ‘ill come,’ said he of the short pipe.” This evolution of the verb “cop” to the noun “copper” was pretty straightforward. It follows the trajectory of how other verbs became nouns, such as “make” to “maker,” “pitch” to “pitcher,” and so on.

Within two decades, the noun “copper” was shortened to just “cop.” In other words, we went from the verb “cop” to the noun “copper,” and then back to “cop,” but this time as a noun. The slang made its way to the United States by the late 1850s, as people began referring to police officers as cops far and wide. 

Other informal and slang terms have similarly clear backstories. For example, “po-po” is a shortened form of “police” that repeats the first syllable, and “five-0” (the numeral 0, not the letter “O”) comes from the television series Hawaii Five-0. (The name comes from Hawaii being the 50th state.) But origin stories aren’t always so well documented; for instance, nobody knows why people refer to police as fuzz, and yet the slang persists.