The Unexpected Evolution of Language Read Online Free PDF Page A

transition in meaning is, appropriately, baffling … in the modern sense.
    Initially, the word was used to describe, say, a knight who had demonstrated cowardice or been found guilty of perjury or some other crime. After being found guilty, he had “baffled” himself.
    By the mid-seventeenth century, “baffle” lost that meaning and became the familiar word we know today. But why?
    Here’s one clue: In the eighteenth century, sailors wrote of “baffling” winds, which meant winds that blew from various directions and “confused” their ship. Then, in the mid-nineteenth century, “baffle’s” other current meaning came into being: something that drowns out light or noise.
    But neither of these changes fully explains the transition. Most likely, the word changed due to the incredulous responses elicited by stories of those who had been disgraced. If a lord or lady found out that a gallant knight was stealing swine, then he or she would have been shocked, surprised, confused, and bewildered by the news. Good people doing bad things? Baffling!
    balderdash
    ORIGINAL DEFINITION: drink comprised of a mix of liquors
    NEW DEFINITION: nonsense; drivel
    Nowadays, greedy barkeeps water down their drinks, while charging you full price. During Elizabethan times, bartenders had a different way to save some money.
    Let’s say the pub owner was running low on several things: wine, beer, hard cider, etc. He sure didn’t want all that stuff to go to waste, so he mixed it all together. The resultant concoction was called “balderdash,” though it’s not clear if this was its “official” name or an insulting name given to it by customers.
    Come to think of it, the customers probably didn’t care. Most likely, the bartender would sell this swill, which often—gag—included milk, cheaply. Thus, everyone was happy. Bartender gets rid of the crap at the bottom of the bottle or keg; customer gets cheap intoxication.
    The word “balderdash” derives from a Danish word meaning “clatter,” as in “confusing noise.” Thus, it’s easy to see how “balderdash” stopped referring to cheap booze and, by the mid-seventeenth century, meant someone speaking (or writing) nonsense. If your meaning is all jumbled up, then, metaphorically, it resembles that stuff you drink when you’re looking to get drunk but your coin purse is nearly empty.
Balderdash = Bullsh*t!
“Balderdash” is a colorful word that now makes a nice euphemism for the word “bullshit.” Early American movie actors were kings and queens of euphemism, in part because the movies were for so long forced to avoid swear words. (Even certain seemingly innocuous words couldn’t be said under any context: virgin, nuts, goose, and madam, among them.) Here are some of the more creative ways Americans in Hollywood sidestepped a curse word:
     
W. C. Fields would sometimes say “Godfrey Daniels” when confronting something annoying, irritating, or absurd. The nonsense name was simply a way to avoid saying, “Goddamn.”
The Marx Brothers could be heard to say, “Jumping butterballs.” God only knows what that took the place of.
Humphrey Bogart couldn’t even pause when asking Dooley Wilson, “what the … are you playing” as Wilson began to play “As Time Goes By” in Casablanca . Viewers might insert the word “hell.”
    bandwagon
    ORIGINAL DEFINITION: circus wagon carrying a band
    NEW DEFINITION: a movement, often political, with a lot of support
    At first, “bandwagon” meant exactly what its name suggests: a wagon with a band on it. Picture a bunch of excited children, watching as the circus rolls into town on a Saturday morning. The procession would head toward an open field, in which rings and tents soon appeared like magic. Somewhere in the midst of the parade was an open-air wagon on which a band played to drum up excitement, as though any additional prodding was necessary.
    From the 1850s until the early 1900s, that’s what a bandwagon was.