Roots
Some of the choicest
Deepti

When angry with somebody, people often wish they had some new and unique abuses to shout, just for getting their anger out of the system. Today’s words are words from ‘Englishes’ guaranteed to assuage such frustration and the best part is that the listener will have to work hard to understand what they mean.

An impertinent person can be called a jackanapes and all impertinence will fly out of the window in figuring out the word. Originally this word was Jack Napes, perhaps used as a playful name for a tame ape. Etymologists conjecture that the word was born when friends playfully gave a nobleman the title of ‘Jack of an Ape’. This word was the nickname of William de la Pole (1396-1450), Duke of Suffolk, who had inscribed on his badge a clog and chain, normally tied to an ape. With the passage of time, the expression became shortened to the word ‘jackanapes’ of today.

A voracious eater or a greedy eater, obviously a glutton can be called a ‘gundygut’. Although there is little documentation available, by and large it is agreed that this term of abuse originated in Australia. ‘Gundy’ means ‘of little use’ and ‘gut’ refers to the ‘belly’, getting together to produce a ‘useless stomach’.

In Britain, ‘dumb’ refers to a person who cannot speak. In American English, it refers to a stupid person. Both these versions of one word can be traced to the origins of ‘dumb’. In Old English, ‘dumb’ came from the Old Norse ‘dumbr’ that meant ‘mute’. While ‘dom’ the Dutch root and ‘dumm’ the German root both mean ‘stupid.’ Englishes, British and American, take the same word but from different sources, leading to two diverse kinds of meaning. Today’s vocabulary suggests a solution by reserving ‘dumb’ as an abuse and using ‘speech impaired’ for ‘mute’.

From the late Middle English comes a musical word that can safely be used for a chatterbox. ‘Flibbertigibbet’ can refer to anybody who is flighty, scatterbrained or talkative. Etymologists feel that it suggests the sound of idle chatter, hence a new word, ‘flibbertigibbet’.