Fag

Fag (pronounced fag)

(1) Something hanging loose, a flap (mostly archaic except in US technical use in the industrial production of textiles where, in the process of quality inspections, a fag is a rough or coarse defect in the woven fabric).

(2) Slang for a boring or wearisome task (archaic).

(3) The worst part or end of a thing (mostly UK, now archaic).

(4) Offensive slang for a contemptible or dislikeable person (archaic).

(5) Offensive slang for a homosexual male, applied most often to an obvious, (especially effeminate) or “unusual” one (now regarded generally as especially disparaging and contemptuous although within certain LGBTQQIAAOP communities it can be neutral or even endearing (a la the notorious “N-word” when used between African-Americans).

(6) To tire or weary by labor; to be exhausted (usually in the phrase “fagged out”).

(7) A school student allocated to do menial chores for an older pupil (mostly in the English public school system but said to be extinct since the late 1990s although apparently still practiced in some Commonwealth countries with public (private) schools based on the old English model).

(8) Slang for a cigarette (now rare, especially in North America); the Cockney rhyming slang was “oily rag”.

(9) As “fag-end” (as in the stubbed-out, un-smoked end of a cigarette), a remnant of something once larger, longer etc, such as the frayed end of a length of cloth or rope.

(10) As “fag-end administration”, the last months of a government prior to an election.

1425–1475: Assumed to be a clipping of “fag end” (remnant; discarded off-cut), from the late Middle English fagge (flap; broken thread in cloth, loose end) of obscure origin), the later sense-development to the intransitive verb meaning “to droop, to tire, to make weary; drudgery” apparently based on the idea of “a drooping end” or “something limply hanging” dating from the 1520s (the OED (Oxford English Dictionary) suggests an alteration of the verb “flag” in the sense of “to droop or go limp”).  There may be some (remote) connection to the Dutch vaak (sleepiness) and the transitive sense of “to make (someone or something) fatigued or tire by labor” was first noted in 1826.  Those “fagged-out” (from fatiguing labor) were in the 1850s said to have been engaged in “faggery” and from the same era “brain-fag" described “mental fatigue”.  Apparently, although rare, “un-fagged” is a correct construction that may be used to describe the process of cutting the ties binding a bundle of faggots (sticks; kindling).  Functional forms (fag butt, fag lighter, fag grave (an ashtray) etc) are created as required. Fag is a noun and verb, fagging or fagged are verbs and faggish & fagged are adjectives; the noun plural is fags.   

A GIF of Lindsay Lohan enjoying a fag, The Canyons (2013).

The slang meaning “cigarette” dates only from 1888 and was derived from fag-end (applied to many things and attested since the 1610s), a cigarette butt thus one of many fag-ends but “fag” (and the plural “fags”) came much to be associated with cigarettes producing terms such as “packet of fags” and phrases like “back on the fags” (again taking up smoking after giving up for a while).  The use of the term to refer to cigarettes is still heard in parts of the English-speaking world but is almost unknown in the US where use is not advised because there, almost exclusively, “fag” (as a clipping of “faggot”) is a gay slur.  The specific use as “fag-end administration” (a government’s final year or months in office prior to an election) is used in a number of contexts but most interesting is when the period coincides with a change in leadership.  On the basis of the conventional political wisdom (things are more likely to get worse than they are to get better), if a new leader finds their “honeymoon” with the voters is reflected by polls suggesting a likely win in an election, they’re well advised to seize the moment, even if it means “going early” by a year or more.  That was what Anthony Eden (1897-1977; prime minister of the UK 1955-1957) did in 1955 (increasing his party’s majority) whereas John Gorton (1911-2002; prime-minister of Australia 1968-1971) in 1968 and Gordon Brown (b 1951; prime-minister of the UK 2007-2010) in 2008 made the mistake of waiting, things not working out so well.

Inhaling a known carcinogen is of course a bad idea and not recommended but, undeniably, Lindsay Lohan made smoking look sexy.

Faggery (or faggotry) was the system in English public schools in which the younger students acted as servants (there were sometimes other purposes) for the older.  It was part of public school environment Harold Macmillan (1894–1986; prime minister of the UK 1957-1963) said was designed primarily to teach pupils life was “inherently unfair”.  Still, he valued the process and described any chap who hadn't benefited from the experience as having “no background”.  The use in English public schools to describe a junior student who performs “certain duties” for a senior seems first to have been used in 1785 although the practice is documented from the seventeenth century while the schoolboy slang describing the institution’s roles respectively as “fagdom” & “fagmaster” dates from 1902.  In modern use, faggery (less so faggotry but like faggotness, faggotize & faggotism) is used as a gay slur.  The term “faggot voter” was a historic term in the UK & Ireland, used when there was a property qualification attached to the electoral franchise; a legal loophole, it described someone entitled to vote by virtue of holding some form of property title short of fee-simple (freehold), typically a subdivision.  The origin of the term was based on the idea of “faggot” in the sense of the sticks gathered together and bound to make a whole (ie one property with one title fragmented for electoral purposes while not diminishing the quality of the ultimate ownership).  The “loophole” began as an “unintended consequence” of changes to the rules of real property but wasn’t reformed until the late 1800s because so many land-owners and members of parliament made use of it to “stack their constituencies” with voters.

The Duce's contribution.

The Italian term fascismo (a fascist dictatorship; fascism) was from fascio (bundle of sticks) and ultimately from the Latin fasces (bundle of rods containing an axe with the blade projecting).  Relics from Ancient Rome (left) confirm the fascio littorio was represented both with the head of the axe protruding from the centre of the bundled rods of the fasces and through a gape in the side (left) but in Fascist Italy (1922-1943), the official images (right) issued by the state used almost exclusively the latter arrangement.  Fascism was that rare thing in political science; genuinely it was new.

As a shortening of faggot, “fag” is documented as being applied as a term of disparagement to homosexual males from 1914, an invention of American English slang, though related to the earlier (1590s) contemptuous term for a woman, especially an old and unpleasant one (thus a re-purposing of “faggot” in the sense of “a bundle of sticks”, the idea being something awkward to carry, equating “worthless baggage” with “a worthless woman”).  More speculatively, there may be a link with the Yiddish פֿייגעלע‎ (feygele) (literally “little bird” but used (1) as a term of endearment for a loved one, especially a man's wife and (2) in a derogatory manner: a homosexual man).  There may also have been some connection with the English public school slang noun fag which even then carried the suggestion of catamite, from the Latin catamītus (boy kept as a sexual partner), from catamītus, from the Etruscan catmite, from the Ancient Greek Γανυμήδης (Ganumḗdēs) (Ganymede).  In Greek mythology, Ganymede was an attractive Trojan boy abducted by Zeus and taken to Mount Olympus to become his cup-bearer and lover (Ganymede endures as a doublet in that sense).  The term “faggot marriage” was not a synonym of “lavender marriage” (an arrangement in which a homosexual man and a lesbian for purposes of social or professional respectability) but a disparaging reference to gay marriage, an issue that as late as the 1990s the US Republican Party was confident would be a useful “wedge issue”; generational change shifted opinion.

In the same way the now notorious N-word has been re-claimed by certain sub-sets of people of color and is (in context), an acceptable use by or between them, “faggot”, although now regarded generally as especially disparaging and contemptuous, within sub-sets of LGBTQQIAAOP communities it can be neutral or even endearing.  Two inventive variations were “fag hag” (a heterosexual woman who socializes with homosexual men (1969)) and “fag stag” (a heterosexual man who socializes with homosexual men (circa 1995)).  The less common companion slang for men who have many lesbian friends was “dutch boy”, “lesbro” or “dyke tyke”.  Covering all bases, it transpires that those of both sexes (and certainly “any gender”) who associate with lesbian, gay and bisexual people are “fruit flies”.  The story that male homosexuals were called faggots because they were burned at the stake as punishment is an urban legend with no etymological or historical basis.

Portrait of Henry VIII (circa 1538), from the studio of Hans Holbein the Younger (circa 1497-1543), oil on panel, Walker Art Gallery, Liverpool, UK.  The original was part of the Whitehall Mural (depicting the Tudor dynasty) at the Palace of Whitehall, Westminster (lost in a fire in 1698) but there are many copies (the king encouraged the distribution of reproductions, the artist having rendered a most sympathetic portrait).

Burning at the stake sometimes was a punishment meted out to homosexuals in Christian Europe (relying on the scriptural suggestion invoked as the Biblical fate of Sodom and Gomorrah), but in England, although under the reign Henry VIII (1491–1547; King of England (and Ireland after 1541) 1509-1547) parliament had passed The Buggery Act (1533) criminalizing “the detestable and abominable Vice of Buggery committed with Mankind or Beast” and a conviction could attract the death penalty, that was by being hanged rather than incineration.  As it was, death came to be thought so onerous a punishment for what was often a consensual act that prosecutions became rare and in the twentieth century, (Winston Churchill (1875-1965; UK prime-minister 1940-1945 & 1951-1955) explained why cases so rarely reached the courts: “Prosecutors know convictions are difficult to obtain because half the jury wouldn’t believe such things happened and the other half habitually were doing it.”  While the inquisitorial and judicial organs of the Roman Catholic Church may over the centuries have burned at the stake a goodly number of homosexuals, that really was incidental to the process (sort of the “collateral damage” of the day), the sentence imposed usually for other offences (typically heresy).

Faggot was from the Middle English fagot, from the Middle French fagot (bundle of sticks), from the Medieval Latin and Italian fagotto and related to the Old Occitan fagot, the Italian fagotto & fangotto and the Spanish fajo (bundle, wad).  In Italian, a fagotto was (1) a bundle or sack, (2), (figuratively) a clumsy or awkward person (a klutz), or (3) in music, a bassoon and was probably from the Italian fagotto (diminutive of Vulgar Latin facus, from the Classical Latin fascis (bundle of wood), or perhaps the Ancient Greek φάκελος (phákelos) (bundle).  The senses relating to persons, though possibly originating as an extension of the sense "bundle of sticks", could have been reinforced by Yiddish פֿייגעלע‎ (feygele) (literally “little bird” but used (1) as a term of endearment for a loved one, especially a man's wife and (2) in a derogatory manner: a homosexual man).  In English, “fagot” was long the alternative spelling.

Lighting the spark.

Spencer Rascoff (b 1975; CEO of Match Group (Tinder's holding company)) at the Tinder Spark Week 2026 product conference.  Tinder is subject to constant product development and recent innovations include matching based on astrology and tastes in music.  Intriguingly, data-mining revealed Gen Z users (the demographic cohort sandwiched between Millennials & Alphas and roughly those born between 1997 and 2012) wanted IRL (in real life) dating and to this Tinder responded, in March 2026 adding a dedicated tab for users to discover and RSVP to local, “low-pressure” gatherings like trivia nights, pickleball, basket-weaving groups, ceramics classes, and beach tennis (one must be “Photo Verified” to select “Interested” and see other attendees).

There was a time when the most common use of “faggot” was to describe the bundle of sticks used as kindling (small pieces of wood, twigs or other finely-divided fibrous matter used to start a fire) and, when arranged in a pile, these pieces were “the kindling” (from the Middle English kyndelen, from the Old Norse kynda (to inflame), from the Proto-Germanic kundijaną.  Other than the literal use (fire-starting), the word could also be applied figuratively (in the sense of “to arouse or inspire passion, enthusiasm etc”), familiar in phrases such as “the book kindled her interest in the author's work”.  Kindling is however the second stage of the three-part process of fire-starting, tinder first used to light the kindling that then ignites the main fire.  Tinder was from the Middle English tinder, tunder, tender & tonder, from the Old English tynder, from the Proto-Germanic tundrą & tundrǭ (tinder) and related to the Saterland Frisian Tunder (tinder), the Dutch tonder (tinder), the German Zunder (tinder) and the Swedish tända (to light, to set on fire).  Launched in 2012, the Tinder app is an online dating and geosocial networking platform (best understood by the more evocative “hook-up site”).  The Tinder name was adopted because the original (Matchbox) was too similar to the existing match.com (a US dating site) and the idea was of “tinder” as the medium to “spark the fire”.  A genuine cultural phenomenon, Tinder has been highly successful and was the app that legitimized the now universal “swipe feature”.

There can also be figurative use of the literal sense, Ernest Bevin (1881–1951; UK foreign secretary 1945-1951) remarking of his part in the downfall of George Lansbury (1859–1940; leader of the UK Labour Party 1932-1935): “Lansbury has been going about dressed in saint’s martyrdom; I set fire to the faggots.”  Old Ernie Bevin was unsentimental but others had real affection for Lansbury, the historian Alan John Percivale "AJP" Taylor (1906–1990) reflecting on his place in the place in the pantheon by calling him: “The most loveable figure in modern politics” and Harold Laski (1893–1950; LSE (London School of Economics) professor of economics 1926-1950 and chairman of the UK Labour Party 1945-1946) was realistic but generous, summing up Lansbury by saying: “Not a very clear head but with a heart that reached beyond the stars.”.  Ernie Bevin, a most practical politician, had little patience for Laski.  When once the academic economist asked Bevin: “Is there anything more I can do for you?”, he received the tart retort: “Yes. Keep quiet.”  That view was shared by Clement Attlee (1883–1967; prime minister of the UK 1945-1951) who often had cause to be annoyed by Laski giving interviews and issuing public statements contradicting official government policy.  After Laski in August 1945 made a series of embarrassing public remarks regarding potential socialist revolutions (in countries where the government wouldn't welcome such things), Attlee sent a famously blunt letter: “You have no right whatever to speak on behalf of the Government... I can assure you there is widespread resentment in the Party at your activities and a period of silence on your part would be welcome.”  Unlike his predecessor in 10 Downing Street (Winston Churchill), Attlee used as few words as possible but few failed to understand his meaning.  Comrade Stalin (1878-1953; Soviet leader 1924-1953) first saw Attlee at the Potsdam Conference (July-August 1945) and thought him unimpressive, remarking: “Mr Attlee does not look like a man hungry for power” but his mild-mannered countenance was deceptive; in office he proved quite ruthless.

Winds of change: Left: Winston Churchill, left, Harry S Truman (1884–1972; POTUS 1945-1953, centre) and comrade Stalin, right) and Right:, Clement Attlee, left, Harry S Truman, centre and comrade Stalin, right, Potsdam Conference, July & August 1945.  Standing behind the heads of government are (left to right), Fleet Admiral William Leahy (1875–1959; Chief of Staff to the Commander in Chief (POTUS) 1942-1945, Ernest Bevin, James Byrnes (1882–1972; US Secretary of State 1945–1947) and comrade Vyacheslav Molotov (1890–1986; Soviet foreign minister 1939-1949 & 1953-1956).  Franklin Delano Roosevelt (FDR, 1882–1945, POTUS 1933-1945) valued Admiral Leahy’s advice on military and political matters but didn’t rely on his views on physics.  Famously, the admiral’s view of the Manhattan Project (developing the first nuclear weapons) was it would “…be a failure and I say that as an explosives expert”.  He was of course proved wrong but his reputation didn’t suffer.

Held in Brandenburg's Cecilienhof Palace in what would soon become the GDR (Deutsche Demokratische Republik (German Democratic Republic; the old East Germany, 1949-1990)), was the last of the three (following Tehran, 28 November-1 December 1943 & Yalta, 4-11 February 1945) World War II (1939-1945) meetings of the heads of government of the UK, US & USSR.  Truman and comrade Stalin attended for the duration while Churchill represented the UK until 24 July, leaving for London the following day to be present for the declaration the general election results.  He left without saying farewell to Truman and Stalin because he expected to be re-elected and return within days.  Instead, in a landslide, the Conservatives were defeated and, on 28 July, the Labour Party’s prime minister Attlee flew to Potsdam for the conference’s resumption.  The defeat provoked a variety of reactions within the Soviet delegation.  Comrade Stalin, who had no particular objection to elections, believing “it mattered not who voted but rather who counted the votes”, was surprised, having assumed the Conservative Party would have “fixed” the result while Churchill’s personal physician noted in his diary the comment of one female Soviet soldier who, on hearing the news, said she expected Mr Attlee would “…now have Mr Churchill shot”.  On 29 July, leaving Chequers (the prime minister’s Buckinghamshire country house) for what he assumed would be the last time, Churchill signed “finis” in the visitors’ book but was too pessimistic, returning to office in 1951 and staying (despite a severe stroke in 1953), until 1955, resisting the efforts by many of his colleagues to “prise him out”. 

A sincere form of flattery: North American F-86 Sabre (first flown October 1947, left) and Mikoyan-Gurevich MiG-15 (first flown December 1947, right).

A well-crafted amalgam of technology stolen from the West (the airframe construction techniques from the US, the jet-engine a blatant copy of the British Rolls-Royce Nene and the aerodynamics from German research during World War II), the USSR’s Mikoyan-Gurevich MiG-15 was a short-range interceptor, the appearance of which in the skies of the Korean War (1950-1953) theatre was such a shock to the UN (United Nations) forces that the USAF (US Air Force) had to scramble to assemble squadrons of North American F-86 Sabres for deployment.  Made in both the USSR and by licensed overseas constructors, the MiG-15 was produced in extraordinary numbers (some sources suggest as many as 17,700) and equipped not only Warsaw Pact (1955-1991, a “mutual-assistance” treaty between the states behind the Iron Curtain within Moscow’s sphere of influence; it was formed in response to NATO) militaries, some three dozen air forces eventually using the type; it remained in front-line service well into the 1960s.  Simple, robust and economical to operate, they proved ideal as jet-trainers because the predictable characteristics made them forgiving in novice hands; in private ownership, many still fly.  Soviet consumer goods of the post-war years may have been of dubious quality and often in short supply (shoes for example were available in black or brown but brown was usually out-of-stock) but the MiGs were well-built and numerous.

The MiG-15’s NATO (North Atlantic Treaty Organization; the trans-Atlantic alliance formed in 1949 as a defensive system for Western Europe designed (in the phrase of General Lord (Hastings “Pug”) Ismay (1887–1965; secretary general of NATO 1952–1957): “to keep the Russians out, the Americans in and the Germans down”) reporting name was “Fagot”.  Officially, NATO reporting names have no linguistic or etymological significance, being chosen (1) with an initial letter indicating type (B=bomber; F=fighter; C=commercial & cargo; H=helicopter; M= miscellaneous) and (2) a one-syllable name for propeller aircraft and a two-syllable name for jets.  Fagot was just another reporting name picked from NATO’s list of the possible for allocation to fighters.

Fairytale of New York (1987) is a song by the Irish pop-band The Pogues, augmented for the occasion by the late Kirsty MacColl (1959-2000).  One stanza included the lines:

You're a bum

You're a punk

You're an old slut on junk

Lying there almost dead on a drip in that bed

You scumbag, you maggot

You cheap lousy faggot

Happy Christmas your arse

I pray God it's our last

The offending (in the sense of “offensive”) line obviously was: “You cheap lousy faggot” and for many years, every Christmas, there was in England an almost ritualistic argument about whether it was appropriate to play the piece on radio, a matter of some interest because Fairytale of New York frequently was voted the nation’s most popular Christmas song, something displeasing many reverend and right reverend gentlemen although Lambeth Palace seems never to have commented on the squabble.  In the late 1980s, the BBC (British Broadcasting Corporation) seemed unconcerned at the possibility of a gay slur being thought at least implied but found the anatomical slang offensive, asking that “arse” be replaced with “ass”, a liberal approach compared with the old BBC tradition of outright bans (a policy that endured long after Sir John Reith's (later Lord Reith, 1889–1971; BBC Director-General 1927-1938) era) but, in the 1990s, sensitivities shifted to gender and, in subsequent live performances, MacColl sometimes adjusted the lyrics further, singing "You're cheap and you're haggard".  Since then, broadcasts have varied in the version carried, the BBC even permitting all or some of “arse”, “slut” & “faggot” on certain outlets but not others.  There was also use of the old practice “bleeping out” (actually scrambling) “arse”, “slut” & “faggot” as required and even today it's said to be unpredictable just which version will be played.  It did seem one of the more improbable battlefields of the culture wars but was emblematic of the new censorship.  Although, in the context of the song, it was obvious “faggot” was being used in the old sense of meaning “someone worthless” rather than “a bit of a homosexual”, the objection was to the very word which many activists demand should be proscribed, the same fate suffered by “niggardly”, a word with an etymology as unrelated to the notorious “N-word” as the meaning.

Tit

Tit (pronounced tit)

(1) Any of numerous small active old world songbirds of the family Paridae, especially those of the former genus Parus.

(2) Medieval slang for a girl or young woman thought something of a minx.

(3) A small, worthless or worn-out poor horse; a nag (archaic).

(4) Slang for a despicable or unpleasant person (archaic).

(5) Slang for a teat (used in agricultural and other circles).

(6) As titbit, a small morsel of food (historic English use, tidbit now the mor common form and universal in the US).

(7) One of the many vulgar slang terms for the human female’s breast (mammary gland).

(8) A light blow or hit (sometimes merely gestural or symbolic).  This use as a stand-alone noun has long been obsolete but the sense survives in the phrase "tit for tat").

(9) Lightly to strike; to pat or tap (obsolete). 

(10) To taunt, to reproach, to castigate (obsolete). 

Circa 1600: From the mid sixteenth century Middle English titte, from the pre 1100 Old English titt and cognate with the Middle Low German & Middle Dutch titte, the German as zitze, the Icelandic tittr and the Norwegian titta.  The Scandinavian forms applied to small birds and the Old English titt was a variant of teat.  The modern slang variation, attested from 1928, seems to be a recent reinvention from teat, used apparently without awareness it’s a throwback to the original form although the form is on record from 1746 as an English and Irish diminutive of teat, used in nurseries.  The verb forms (lightly striking; reproaching) are obsolete.  Tit is a noun & verb, titlike is an adjective and titting & titted are verbs; the noun plural is tits.

A pair of small tits and a pair of great tits: Bushtits (Psaltriparus minimus, left) and great tits (Parus major, right), the word order of the latter descriptor distinguishing use from the more common idiomatic form: "a great pair of tits".

Among the smaller tits is the bushtit (Psaltriparus minimus), found in the US Pacific Northwest, the tiny songbird typically 100-110 mm (3.9-4.3 inches) in length and weighing 4–6 grams (0.14–0.21 oz).  The pygmy tit (Psaltria exilis) is smaller and a monotypic now within the genus Psaltria (it was previously placed, along with the rest of its family, with the true tits (Paridae).  The largest of the tits is the widely distributed great tit (Parus major) which measures usually between 135-155 mm (5.3-6.1 inches) in length and weighs 16-21 grams (6-.81 oz).  In ornithology, tits, chickadees, and titmice constitute the Paridae, a large family of small passerine birds found mostly in Africa and the more temperate regions of the Northern Hemisphere and Africa.  Most were formerly classified in the genus Parus; in the English-speaking world the terms chickadee & titmice tend to be used in North America while its elsewhere it's  “tits all the way” (the Americans also resisted  “titbits” and were more reassured by “tidbits”).  The creatures are mainly small, stocky, woodland species with short, stout bills, some with crests and ranging in length between 4-9 inches (100-220 mm); they have a mixed diet including seeds & insects and have adapted well to co-habitation with humans in urban environments.  It seems linguistically pleasing ornithological taxonomy has given English the black-breasted tit (Periparus rufonuchalis), the cinnamon-breasted tit (Melaniparus pallidiventris) and the stripe-breasted tit (Melaniparus fasciiventer).

The origin of familiar use of “tit” as slang for “breast, human female mammary gland” (now also as "tittie" or "titty" although they also enjoyed other meanings) lies in the Old English titt (teat, nipple, breast), used as a variant of teat or from the dialectal and nursery diminutive plural variant “titties”.  Perhaps surprisingly, it appears the modern slang use in this context (predictably, almost always in the plural) is documented only from 1928 (though oral use may have pre-dated this) and the adoption (actually a re-invention) may be unconnected to the original form.  The tradition was however long because in the Middle English the singular was often tete or tate, often used figuratively to mean both “source of (spiritual) nourishment” and by the late fourteenth century, an “object of erotic attraction”.  In modern slang use, it appears the use of “tits” was almost exclusively male until the 1970s when it became of the words “reclaimed” by feminists as a political statement although, as a general principle women seem still to prefer “boobs” while there is among them (usually in a disparaging sense) acceptance of “fake tits” as a critique.

Shima-Enaga in flight (left) and young lady with her pair of Shima-Enaga plushies.

The Shima-Enaga (シマエナガ) is most prolific in the region of Hokkaido, Japan but they inhabit the entire Paleatrictic (a bio-geographic realm of the Earth and the largest of the eight defined; mostly in the Eastern Hemisphere, it extends eastward from Europe, across Asia, north of the foothills of the Himalayas, to the Bering Strait and south to the Mediterranean Basin, North Africa & northern Arabia.  It thus encompasses several bioregions and freshwater eco-regions).  The Shima-Enaga is a sub-species of the long-tailed tit (also as long-tailed bushtit) and is famous for its fluffy appearance and snowman-like features (especially in winter when they puff up their feathers to stay warm), leading it popularly to be known as the “snow fairy”.  Social creatures, they are renowned for their curious and active behaviour; living mostly on arthropods (mostly insects), they also eat a variety of vegetable matter.  The word “cute” could have been invented for the Shima-Enaga and they’re a staple of the vibrant Japanese plushie industry.

By the 1540s “tit” was used for a small or unproductive horse, the sense of something “diminutive” transferring over later centuries to other small creatures, most enduringly in birds such as the titmouse, tom-tit, titlark, titling, tit-babbler etc although not all survived to be added to modern taxonomy such as the late nineteenth century titty-todger (a wren); it seems a shame we no longer have titty-toger in the lexicon.  In the Nordic nations, the Icelandic tittr, the Norwegian tita and the Old Norse titling were all used of small birds but etymologists are uncertain about the connection, the OED (Oxford English Dictionary) suggesting the link was of either something small (not of necessity specific to birds) or even onomatopoeic, drawn from the “chip-chipping” sound of small songbirds.  At least by 1706 it was common slang for “titmouse” and by 1734 was used figuratively of persons but between the sixteenth & eighteenth centuries a “tit” could be a “girl or young woman” and while that could be merely descriptive, it was applied often in the deprecatory sense of “a hussy or minx” (though apparently not actually a prostitute).

Big tits are not always what they seem.

Some years ago, an image circulated on internet's “usual suspect” sites; it purported to show a wax-paper bag from the 1930s, used originally as packaging for “Big Tits Potato Chips” manufactured by the Tart-Chestnut Company of Dunn, North Carolina.  The back-story was the name came from “Big Tits” being the nickname of the rather corpulent Mr Titus Tart, one of the operation's co-owners (the implication presumably he was over-fond of his factory's products).  As might be suggested by a product called “Big Tits” coming from a the “Tart-Chestnut” concern, it was fake news although that didn't stop debates about whether the use of “tit” in its modern sense was part of US vernacular in the Carolinas by the 1930s, some even suggesting the linguistic innovation may not have penetrated south of the Mason-Dixon line because there, dictionaries of slang may have been banned from public libraries on grounds of obscenity.  Plausibility might have been enhanced had the image been rendered with a little patina although as an emulation of 1930s packaging it did seem a creditable job, the art deco typeface a nice period touch and even the colors recalled the inter-war years (1919-1939).

Lindsay Lohan with a table of titbits: Ruffled top by Christian Siriano (b 1985), necklace by Swarovski, photo-shoot for Who What Wear UK, November 2022.

The form “titbit” (small, delicate snack of food; a sweet morsel) was in use by the 1630s and was synonymous with “tidbit” which was in concurrent use, the coining of that thought to be the dialectal tid (fond, solicitous, tender (itself perhaps influenced by the relevant sense of “tit”)) + bit (in the sense of “a morsel”).  Tidbit was once the common use in the UK & other parts of the old British Empire but in US English was vanishingly rare, tidbit long preferred.  Also surviving into modern use is “tit for tat”, (an expression indicating “a retaliatory return”), first documented in the 1550s and from this ultimately came “titfer” which appeared in UK dictionaries of rhyming slang as a substitute for “hat” (in from the “that” element in “this for that”).  “Tit for tat” may have been a variant of the earlier “tip for tap” (blow for blow), carrying the same meaning.  The game tick-tack-toe (noughts & crosses) was so named at least by 1892 but, according to oral historians, decades before it had been known as tit-tat-toe (by 1852, in reminiscences of earlier years), the name thought derived from the sound made by the pencil on the slate with which it originally was played by schoolboys.  The modern slang “taking the bull by the tits” is an absurdist variant of “taking the bull by the horns” (confronting a problem and dealing with it in a manner prompt, resolute & effective”); it suggests someone is doing something wrong or has misunderstood (ie they have NFI).

Hung out to dry.

Titlings being prepared on the shores of a Norwegian fiord.  First crossing the seas with the Vikings (the food was ideal for long voyages) in the 800s, stockfish is still an industry in Norway and is reputedly the world’s oldest, continuously practiced export trade. That's disputed by some in the Middle & Far East who cite products such as silk, honey, figs, dates and such and it all seems to hinge on hoe one defines “continuously”.

The noun titling (plural titlings) can be unrelated to avian and other uses of “tit” and its derived forms.  At law, a titling was a legal right to property (ie holding a valid title defensible against other claims).  The word was used also in publishing (deciding on a title) and by printers (impressing the title on the back of a book); as a verb, titling was thus the present participle and gerund of title.  The noun use does however extend to birds and even the fish trade.  A titling could be either a hedge sparrow (dunnock, titlene, Prunella modularis) or the meadow pipit (Anthus pratensis) while among fishmongers, it referred to the stockfish (cod (or similar species) having been cut open and cured in the open air without salt (the terms for the “dried & salted catch” included klipfish and salt cod).  Stockfish was from Middle English stokfissh & stokfysch, from the Middle Dutch stocvisch and/or the Middle Low German stokvisch (stick fish), that from the fish being dried in the open air on sticks or poles.

In the pre-refrigeration age, dried fish was a staple of the industry although, as an open-air process, it was climate-dependent but, being a long-lasting product (safely, it could be stored for years), exports in bulk were common, the business in the British Isles common enough for some traders to be styled “stockfishmongers” and, in early medieval London, the area around Thames Street (near St Magnus the Martyr church) was known as Stockfishmonger Row because it was here the trade was concentrated; the product was an important, year-round source of low-cost nutrition.  Until 1512, the stockfishmongers of London (then, like many professions, family concerns handed from father-to-son) operated as a distinct trade association at which point they merged with the other (fresh) fishmongers to form the Worshipful Company of Fishmongers, one of the Great Twelve Livery Companies of the City of London (unlike the Freemasons, there’s nothing to suggest the fishmongers were notorious plotters & schemers) and it was a respectable business, one fourteenth century stockfishmonger serving three terms as Lord Mayor of London.  That was an office of some note, known in the thirteenth century Latin as Dominus (lord or master) before by the early 1400s being styled “Lord Mair”.  Mair was from the Middle English maire, from the Old French maire (head of a city or town government), a substantivation of the Old French maire (greater), from the Latin maior (bigger, greater, superior (a comparative of magnus (big, great) and doublet of major)).  It was cognate with the Old High German meior (estate manager, steward, bailiff (enduring in modern German in the surnames Meyer & Meier)) and the Middle Dutch meier (administrator, steward, bailiff).  It displaced the Old English burgealdor (a ruler of a city, mayor, citizen), burhġerēfa (boroughreeve) (headman of a borough or district) & portġerēfa (portreeve) (headman of a port).  In the 1500s, Lord Mayors became the first officials to be styled “Right Honourable” (now most associated with privy counsellors although certain members of the peerage also enjoy a right to the title).

Meier & Meyer are in Germany common surnames (something like “Smith” or “Jones” in English), sometimes used in idiomatic expressions.  Hermann Göring (1893–1946; leading Nazi 1922-1945, Hitler's designated successor & Reichsmarschall 1940-1945) came to regret his use, telling the nation on the outbreak of World War II (1939-1945): “No enemy bomber can reach the Ruhr. If one reaches the Ruhr, my name is not Göring.  You can call me Meyer.”  Göring well knew the expression of the era: “The bomber will always get through” but had come to believe his own publicity about the invincibility of the Luftwaffe (the German air force), confident it was only his bombers that would get through.  Unfortunately for him, the RAF (Royal Air Force) didn’t believe the publicity (propaganda) and staged their first small-scale air-raids on Berlin in 1940, doing little damage but denting Göring’s prestige.  Cynical Berliners were noted for their sardonic humor and quickly dubbed the air-raid warning sirens “Meyer’s trumpets”, re-naming the Reichsmarschall: “Herr Meyer”.  However, unlike many politicians (then and now), Göring took the view people telling jokes about him meant he was popular and these his staff collected, pasting them (along with cartoons & caricatures) into a scrapbook that gleefully he would read; there’s no record of him seeking retribution on the authors.  Indeed, late in the war, caught in the open during an air raid, as hastily as was possible for someone of his bulk, he made his way into the closest underground shelter and joined the crowd, announcing cheerfully: “Herr Meyer is here.”  He was well-received.

Gown

Gown (pronounced goun) 

(1) A type of woman's dress or robe, especially one full-length and worn on formal occasions and often styled as “evening gown” or “ball gown”.

(2) As nightgown, a loose fitting garment worn by sleeping (historically by both men & women but now most associated with the latter); the shortened for is “nightie”.

(3) As surgical gown, a light, protective garment worn in hospitals by medical staff, a specialized form of which is the isolation gown.

(4) As dressing gown (also call bathrobe), a garment in the form of an open robe secured by a tie and often worn over pajamas, after a bath and prior to dressing or on other occasions where there’s no immediate need to dress.

(5) A loose, flowing outer garment in various forms, worn to denote an office held, profession practiced or as an indication of rank or status, most associated with formal academic dress (sometimes in the phrase “cap & gown”).

(6) Those who work or study at a university as opposed to the other residents of the university town, expressed in the phrase “town & gown”.

(7) Historically, the dress of civil, as opposed to military officers.

(8) To supply with or dress in a gown.

1300-1350: From Middle English goune & gowne, from Anglo-Norman gune & goune (fur-trimmed coat, pelisse), from the Old French goune (robe, coat; nun's habit), from the Late Latin gunna (a garment of fur or leather), from the Ancient Greek γούνα (goúna) (coarse garment), of unknown origin but may be from a Balkan or Apennine language where it seems to have been used as early as the eighth century to describe a fur (or fur-lined), cloak-like garment worn by old or infirm monks; More speculatively, some scholars suggest a Celtic source.  The alternative explanation suggests a Scythian origin, from the Proto-Iranian gawnám (fur), the possibility of this link supported by the Younger Avestan gaona (body hair) and the Ossetian гъун (ǧun).  The alternative spelling gowne is obsolete and descendants in other languages include the Bengali গাউন (gaun), the Japanese ガウン, the Korean  가운 (gaun), the Malay gaun, the Punjabi ਗਾਊਨ (gāūna) and the Welsh gown.  Gown is a noun and verb and gowned is an adjective; the noun plural is gowns.

Surgeon in blood-splattered surgical gown (also called hospital or medical gowns), mid-procedure.

As late as the eighteenth century, gown was the common word for what is now usually described as dress and gown in this sense persisted in the US longer than in the UK and there was on both sides of the Atlantic something of a twentieth century revival and the applied uses (bridal gown, nightgown etc) became more or less universal.  The meaning “a loose, flowing outer garment in various forms, worn to denote an office held, profession practiced or as an indication of rank” emerged in the late fourteenth century and the collective singular for “residents of a university” dates from the 1650s, still heard in the rhyming phrase “town & gown”.  The night-gown (worn once by both men & women but now associated almost exclusively with the latter) became a thing in the fourteenth century.

Lindsay Lohan in white & black color-blocked bandage dress.  With a flawless figure, Ms Lohan doesn't need the "corrective" effects the bandage construction provides and this one may really be a bodycon dress with the visual effect of "bandage layers" created by stitched folds. 

Dress dates from circa 1300 and was from the Middle English dressen & dresse (to arrange, put in order), from the Anglo-Norman & Old French dresser, drecier (which persists in as dresser), from the unattested Vulgar Latin dīrēctiāre, from the Classical Latin dīrēctus, the perfect passive participle of dīrigō (to arrange in lines, direct, steer), the construct being dis- (the prefix in this context meaning “apart; asunder; in two’) + regō (to govern, manage), ultimately from the primitive Indo-European h₃reǵ- (straight, right).  The noun dress was derived from the verb and emerged in the sense of “attire” in the early 1600s.  Originally, a dress was always something which covered both the upper and lower parts of the female body but not of necessity in once piece.  The dressing gown seems first to have been described as such in 1854 although in French both robe de chambre (dressing gown) & robe de nuit (nightgown) had been in use for centuries.

Lindsay Lohan in dressing gowns; in the US such things would usually be called bathrobes.

Robe dates from the mid-thirteenth century Middle English robe & robbe and was from the Old French robe, robbe & reube (booty, spoils of war, robe, garment), from the Frankish rouba & rauba (booty, spoils, stolen clothes (literally “things taken”)), from the Old High German roub, from the Proto-Germanic raubō, raubaz & raubą (booty, that which is stripped or carried away), from the primitive Indo-European Hrewp- (to tear away, peel off).  The noun use of robe to refer to garments had entered general use by the late thirteenth century, an adoption of a meaning from the Old French, presumably because fine clothing looted from defeated enemies were among the most prized of the spoils of war.  The Old French robe (and the alternative spellings) had as concurrent meanings both “clothing” & “plunder: as did the Germanic forms including the Old English reaf (plunder, booty, spoil; garment, armor, vestment).  By the late thirteenth century, robe had assumed the meaning “a long, loose outer garment reaching almost to the floor, worn by men or women over other dress”, those closest European equivalents being the twelfth century Old French robe (long, loose outer garment) and the Old High German rouba (vestments).  In royal, academic and ecclesiastical circles, the particular style of robes became regulated to denote rank, function or or membership of a religious order and royal courts would include offices like “page of the robes”, “mistress of the robes”, master of the robes etc” although those titles are (to modern eyes) misleading because their responsibilities extended to garments generally and not just robes as they’re now understood.  The metonymic sense of “the robe” for "the legal profession" dates from the 1640s, a reference to the dark robes worn by advocates when appearing in court.  Robe went on productively to be adopted for other purposes including (1) in the US “the skin of a bison (later applied to other slaughtered beasts) used as a cloak or wrap, (2) a short form of wardrobe (especially when built into a wall rather than being stand-alone) and (3) the largest and strongest leaves on a tobacco plant.

Singer Dr Taylor Swift in academic gown after being conferred an honorary doctorate in fine arts from New York University, May 2022.

In formal and vocational use, gown and robe and well understood and there tends not to be overlap except among those unacquainted with such things.  That’s understandable because to the casual observer the things can look much the same and the differences in nomenclature are more to do with tradition than style or cut.  Judges for example ware judicial robes and in the US these are usually black whereas elsewhere in the English-speaking world they can be of quite vivid hues, red and scarlet the most admired.  The US influence however seem pervasive and the trend is now almost universally black, certainly among newly established courts; in the same courts, barristers robes look much the same the term “judicial robe” is exclusive to the bench, the advocates garments variously called “barristers’ robes” “legal robes” or lawyers’ robes”.  Academics however wear gowns and again, the Americans tend to favor black while in the English tradition, all the colors of the rainbow have been seen.  These differ from surgical (also known as hospital or medical gowns) which, compared with just about every other gown, really aren’t gowns at all.  Surgical gowns are made usually in a blue, beige or green pastel color (better to show the blood) and are a kind of inverted dress which is fastened at the back (by an assistant so the wearer’s fingers don’t pick up germs).  In the UK parliament, there were many robes for offices of state and the one worn by the speaker made its way to colonial and dominion parliaments.  They're now rarely worn except on ceremonial occasions and the best known is probably that of the UK’s chancellors of the exchequer although the last one, dating from the late nineteenth century, is said to have “gone missing” while Gordon Brown (b 1951; UK prime-minister 2007-2010) was chancellor.

The Welsh Wizard robed: Lloyd George as Chancellor of the Exchequer (1911) (David Lloyd George, 1863–1945; UK prime-minister 1916-1922, severed as chancellor between 1908-1915), oil on canvas by Christopher Williams (1873–1934), National Library of Wales collection.

Winston Churchill (1875-1965; UK prime-minister 1940-1945 & 1951-1955) was in 1924 both surprised and delighted when Stanley Baldwin (1867–1947; UK prime-minister 1923-1924, 1924-1929 & 1935-1937) offered him the Treasury; he’d heard rumors of appointed “chancellor” as assumed the best he could hope for was the chancellorship of the Duchy of Lancaster which, although an ancient office dating from the fourteenth century, he knew to be little more than a sinecure of slight influence, having in 1915 been for a few months relegated there after leaving the Admiralty in the wake of the failure of the Dardanelles campaign.  To atone, he went to the trenches of the Western Front and for some six month commanded a regiment of the Royal Scots Fusiliers.  Though never forgotten, much was by 1924 forgiven and Churchill was pleased to tell the prime minister he’d be glad to take the exchequer, one slight benefit to the public purse being “I still have the robes my father (Lord Randolph Churchill (1849–1895; Chancellor of the Exchequer August-December 1886)) wore as chancellor”.  In retrospect, that sartorial convenience might have been an inadequate background for handling the nation’s finances and Churchill often is listed high up the list of the UK’s “worst chancellors”, the main charge being returning sterling to the gold standard and maintaining an over-valued currency but just about all the great institutions of state (the Treasury, the Cabinet, the Bank of England etc) and most economists (a notable dissenter being John Maynard Keynes (later Lord Keynes) 1883-1946) who predicted depression as a consequence) recommended the move.  Still, it was Churchill was who signed the documents and the consensus among historians of such things is that had he known anything of economics, he’d likely have signed with even greater alacrity.

NSW (New South Wales (Australia)) Supreme Court and Court of Appeal judges in judicial robes and wigs for a ceremonial event during the COVID-19 pandemic.

It’s in women’s fashion where the distinction between a gown and a dress can become muddied and probably most illustrative is the matter of the “wedding dress” and the “wedding gown”.  Even among couturiers, there’s actually no agreed definition of where one ends and the other begins; it’s very much in the eye of the beholder although the eye of the retailer is doubtless quite an influence, the theory being the grander the design and the greater the volume of fabric, the more plausible is the label “wedding gown” and the higher the price-tag.  These informal (but serviceable) rules of thumb work also for dresses & gowns in general, the distinction more one of semantics and personal preference although, in saying that, it’s only at the margins where there can be confusion; a minimalist LBD (little black dress) would never be confused with a gown and the grandest creations recalling those worn at the famous balls held in conjunction with the Congress of Vienna (1814-1815) would never be called dresses.

Watercolor by unknown artist of one of the many balls held during the Congress of Vienna (1814-1815).  Being ankle-length, gowns were not the ideal garment for ladies dancing and it's likely some made temporary modifications, "hitching them up" a bit.

Despite that, in the narrow technical sense, to a seamstress, all gowns are dresses, but not all dresses are gowns and as late as the early eighteenth century the word "dress" was still not the exclusive province of women’s clothing ensembles.  In recent centuries, the dress has been defined by its modifiers (sun-dress, summer-dress, evening-dress, travelling dress, tent dress, riding-dress etc) and the modern convention seems to be that if an invitation specifies "semi-formal" then an evening dress is expected and that might be something thought a gown but not necessarily.  However, when an invitation states that the occasion is "formal", women are expected to wear an evening gown.  Classically, that’s understood to be something at once precise yet frivolous, with a tight fitting bodice and a skirt at least brushing the floor and this was once the accepted standard for any red-carpet event of note but the recent trend towards displays of flesh has in the entertainment industry subverted the tradition although the audience is expected still to adhere.

Illustrating the modern gown: Actor Lindsay Lohan (b 1986) in a gown with an upper-level silk tulle (a netting-like weave) by Zac Posen (b 1980), Met Gala, New York, 2007 (left) and model Kate Upton (b 1992) in a gown by Victoria Beckham (b 1974, the one-time “Posh Spice”, now Lady Beckham), Vanity Fair Oscars after-party, Los Angeles, 2016.

Fashion has since the Congress of Vienna become simplified and rather than voluminous layers of fabric, a gown’s effects are now generated by cut & color.  For his diaphanous piece, Zac Posen included a quadrilateral (a four-sided polygon) cleavage split, designed cleverly to emulate a tie (in Euclidean geometry defined as a “kite” (two pairs of adjacent, equal-length sides with the two shorter sides meeting at the bottom vertex, the longer pair intersecting at the top so a line described from top to bottom produces an axis of reflection symmetry, as does the fall of a tie)).  What Lady Beckham included would probably now be called a “uvage” although physiology can affect outcome; on a different model (with less pronounced “forward projection”) the fabric would likely fall to create a “veagage”.  While there can be overlaps in cut, construction and cues, there are points at which a LBD becomes re-defined as a “dress” (possibly with a modifier or two) or a “gown”.  Although motifs can matter (what sometimes appears on a gown often not suitable for a LBD that depends on simplicity for effect) the prime determinate really is length, the classic LBD’s hemline stopping somewhere on the thighs while a gown properly should be ankle-length although calf-left implementations have become not uncommon.  The “rule” is however selectively applied and depends also on style and intended purpose; an ankle-length “maxi-dress” will typically not be a “gown”.  Again, physiology can also influence things, someone especially statuesque could appear in a LBD while the same garment on someone shorter might be classed a “black cocktail dress”, simply because the hemline reaches below the knee.  So usually it’s not difficult to tell what is a gown but, at the margins, the distinctions can become blurred and it’s really “eye of the beholder” stuff, a subjective exercise expressed best (in another context) by Potter Stewart (1915–1985; associate justice of the SCOTUS (US Supreme Court) 1958-1981) in his famous concurring judgement in Jacobellis v Ohio (378 U.S. 184 (1964)): “I shall not today attempt further to define the kinds of material I understand to be embraced within [the term], and perhaps I could never succeed in intelligibly doing so.  But I know it when I see it…”