The original
TERMinal CAPabilities database from
BSD (I believe).
AT&T System V attempted to supersede it with terminfo. However, until ncurses came along, the open source movement viewed this with some distrust.
Termcap comprises a terminal capabilities database - being a monolithic text file with cryptic annotations for the capabilities - and a C library to enable application programs to determine a particular terminal's abilities.
See also
terminfo,
curses,
ncurses,
vi.