What is grocer's shop?

What Does grocer's shop Mean

The concept of grocery store is used in several Latin American countries to refer to the trade where food and various products of frequent use are offered . According to the dictionary of the Royal Spanish Academy ( RAE ), the term derives from pulp , since in the beginning they sold fruits and sweets that were made from them. There are, however, other theories about the origin of the name.

The pulperías were born in the 16th century and were the most frequent stores until the beginning of the 20th century . They were found very frequently in various Spanish-speaking countries, both in Central and South America.

People could find in these establishments everything they needed for their daily lives, from food products to medicines, drinks, candles, raw materials for sewing, charcoal and many other items .
Many times the grocery stores were also constituted as spaces for social gathering . People, especially in towns or small towns, flocked to these places to play cards or dice , to listen to the singers or simply to chat. It was an ideal place to keep abreast of the news as it brought together people from various parts.
It is important to bear in mind that the grocery stores had different characteristics depending on the region . It is that they were the living portrait of the culture of each place, where those customs that most represented them were kept alive and that united citizens with more strength than any government can have.
In some areas they hardly exist or are called differently, while in other places the term is still popular. In Argentina , for example, the idea of ​​pulpería refers to the rural warehouses that spread over much of the territory of Buenos Aires and other provinces at the beginning of the 19th century .
Currently there are a few grocery stores, many times converted into another kind of business. New ventures inspired by the grocery stores of yesteryear were also opened.
Due to the vastness of the Argentine surface, the pulperías were a meeting point for the gauchos . The artist Florencio Molina Campos (1891-1959) portrayed the atmosphere of these places in several of his paintings.
One of the first issues that the term draws attention is that it does not seem to reflect at first glance the idea of ​​a canteen or commercial store. In fact, there are at least three theories regarding its origin. The first postulates qe is related to the terms octopus or pulp . For some experts the meaning of pulpería refers to the fact that in some of them octopus was sold , both raw and in the form of the recipe called Galician octopus , while for others it is related to fruit pulp , something that could also be consume there.

As a side note before continuing with the theories, the chronicler Garcilaso de la Vega said that the sellers of few resources were known by the name of pulperos . Another of the possible origins of the name is found in the drink called pulque , which is prepared in Mexico using the leaves of the maguey plant and is generally sold in pulquerías . This was proposed by Solórzano Pereira in the middle of the seventeenth century in his book Indiana Politics . In other words , the term grocery store would have mutated, losing the pair -qu- after the letter p .
Finally, there are those who associate the idea of ​​the many tentacles of the octopus with the constant activity of the shop assistants, who had to act with great agility to satisfy all their customers, as if they had many arms . This theory is the least respected of the three.