# Little Miss Muffet, revisited **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [November 27, 2014, 3:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/little-miss-muffet-revisited/705767 "2014-11-27T15:57:31Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 10\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Lucas\_Jackson](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lucas_jackson/32/303_2.png) [@Lucas\_Jackson](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lucas_Jackson)\ **Post date:** [November 27, 2014, 3:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/little-miss-muffet-revisited/705767/1 "2014-11-27T15:57:31Z")
I’m reading Bill Bryson’s lovely book At Home and he states the only reason to believe that “tuffet” means stool is due to the nursery rhyme and that the “only place the word appears in historic English is in the nuserey rhyme itself”. Wikipedia is rather muddy on the subject and there are a couple of dictionaries online that give a stool-type device as a definition. But there doesn’t seem to be a strong consensus. There is an [older thread on the subject](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/archive/index.php/t-6820.html) (from 1999) but I didn’t want to bump it and I thought there might be more research available now. So what’s the straight dope, is (was) tuffet a real word and what does it mean regarding the nursery rhyme? ---
**Author:** ![GIGObuster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gigobuster/32/421_2.png) [@GIGObuster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GIGObuster)\ **Post date:** [November 27, 2014, 4:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/little-miss-muffet-revisited/705767/2 "2014-11-27T16:44:07Z")
The Online Ethimology Dictionary reports that it comes from the french. > **[tuffet | Search Online Etymology Dictionary](https://www.etymonline.com/search?q=tuffet)** > > The online etymology dictionary (etymonline) is the internet's go-to source for quick and reliable accounts of the origin and history of English words, phrases, and idioms. It is professional enough to satisfy academic standards, but accessible... > [@](#): > > tuffet (n.) > 1550s, “little tuft,” from Old French touffel (with diminutive suffix -et for French -el), diminutive of touffe (see tuft). Obsolete except in the nursery rhyme “Little Miss Muffet” (1843), where it has been felt to mean “hassock, footstool.” Seems that it was thanks in big part to the nursery rime that the word was adopted into English, and then even though it has fallen into obsolescence it has remained viable just because of the nursery rime too. ---
**Author:** ![GIGObuster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gigobuster/32/421_2.png) [@GIGObuster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GIGObuster)\ **Post date:** [November 27, 2014, 5:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/little-miss-muffet-revisited/705767/3 "2014-11-27T17:00:30Z")
Also: > **[Tufting](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tufting)** > > Tufting is a type of textile manufacturing in which a thread is inserted on a primary base. > It is an ancient technique for making warm garments, especially mittens. After the knitting is done, short U-shaped loops of extra yarn are introduced through the fabric from the outside so that their ends point inwards (e.g., towards the hand inside the mitten). > Usually, the tuft yarns form a regular array of "dots" on the outside, sometimes in a contrasting color (e.g., white on red). On the inside, ... > [@](#): > > Tufting is a type of textile weaving in which a thread is inserted on a primary base. It is an ancient technique for making warm garments, especially mittens. After the knitting is done, short U-shaped loops of extra yarn are introduced through the fabric from the outside so that their ends point inwards (e.g., towards the hand inside the mitten). Usually, the tuft yarns form a regular array of “dots” on the outside, sometimes in a contrasting color (e.g., white on red). On the inside, the tuft yarns may be tied for security, although they need not be. The ends of the tuft yarns are then frayed, so that they will subsequently felt, creating a dense, insulating layer within the knitted garment. Adding the tuft the word footstool and putting a bit of French (this sounds like a cooking recipe 🙂 ) in a search we can see what miss Muffet most likely did sit on: [https://www.google.com/search?q=touffel&client=ubuntu&hs=I33&channel=fs&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ei=81R3VLfUCMj8igKF4ICgBA&ved=0CAoQ\_AUoAw&biw=1120&bih=520#channel=fs&tbm=isch&q=tuft+french+footstool&imgdii=\_](https://www.google.com/search?q=touffel&client=ubuntu&hs=I33&channel=fs&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ei=81R3VLfUCMj8igKF4ICgBA&ved=0CAoQ_AUoAw&biw=1120&bih=520#channel=fs&tbm=isch&q=tuft+french+footstool&imgdii=_) ---
**Author:** ![md2000](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/73ab20/32.png) [@md2000](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/md2000)\ **Post date:** [November 27, 2014, 5:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/little-miss-muffet-revisited/705767/4 "2014-11-27T17:18:33Z")
_“Little Miss Muffet sat on a tuffet, eating her curds and whey, Along came a spider, and sat down beside her, …so she squished it with her spoon.”_ I had learned that a tuffet would be large lump covered with grass, a raised hump of old grass, soft, so being a logical outdoor spot to sit, except for the @%#@ spiders. Or else my dad just made things up. ---
**Author:** ![samclem](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a9a28c/32.png) [@samclem](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/samclem)\ **Post date:** [November 27, 2014, 5:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/little-miss-muffet-revisited/705767/5 "2014-11-27T17:28:19Z")
Bryson is a great writer, but a piss poor etymologist and historian. Don’t get me started. > [@OED](#): > > tuffet, n. > Etymology: \< tuff, French touffe (see tuft n.) with suffix-exchange diminutive -et suffix1 for -el suffix1 in Old French touffel.(Show Less) > > ? Obs. exc. dial. > > 1. = tuft n. 1a, 1b. > ?1553 Respublica (1952) iii. vi. 32 The goddesse occasyon…weareth a greate long tuffet of heare beefore and behinde hathe not one heare. > > 1578 H. Lyte tr. R. Dodoens Niewe Herball i. lxxiii. 108 At the toppe of the stalkes groweth blewish floures in thicke tuffets. > > a1691 R. Boyle Gen. Hist. Air (1692) 178 Emerging from the ground like tuffets of rushes. > > 1899 P. Robinson in Contemp. Rev. June 844 [A blackcap] standing between two ‘tuffets’ of bloom. ---
**Author:** ![njtt](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/ecd19e/32.png) [@njtt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/njtt)\ **Post date:** [November 27, 2014, 5:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/little-miss-muffet-revisited/705767/6 "2014-11-27T17:37:04Z")
I always assumed that it was the same thing as (variant form of) a [tussock](http://www.macmillandictionary.com/dictionary/american/tussock), which is what **md2000** said, i.e., a small grassy knoll.(:p) Actually, [OneLook Dictionary Search finds the word “tuffet” in nineteen online dictionaries](http://www.onelook.com/?w=tuffet&ls=b), and yeah, [that is what it means](https://www.ahdictionary.com/word/search.html?q=tuffet). ---
**Author:** ![GIGObuster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gigobuster/32/421_2.png) [@GIGObuster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GIGObuster)\ **Post date:** [November 27, 2014, 5:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/little-miss-muffet-revisited/705767/7 "2014-11-27T17:45:00Z")
> [@njtt](#): > > I always assumed that it was the same thing as (variant form of) a [tussock](http://www.macmillandictionary.com/dictionary/american/tussock), which is what **md2000** said, i.e., a small grassy knoll.(:p) > > Actually, [OneLook Dictionary Search finds the word “tuffet” in nineteen online dictionaries](http://www.onelook.com/?w=tuffet&ls=b), and yeah, [that is what it means](https://www.ahdictionary.com/word/search.html?q=tuffet). Almost all do point also to the other definition: > [@](#): > > definition 2: a low seat, such as a stool. ---
**Author:** ![Lucas\_Jackson](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lucas_jackson/32/303_2.png) [@Lucas\_Jackson](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lucas_Jackson)\ **Post date:** [November 27, 2014, 5:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/little-miss-muffet-revisited/705767/8 "2014-11-27T17:57:28Z")
> [@samclem](#): > > Bryson is a great writer, but a piss poor etymologist and historian. Don’t get me started. As I’m reading I find myself bouncing back and forth to the computer to check some of his incredible claims. They are mostly true - in the sense that they are written to entertain I suppose. Still, it is a fun read. ETA: thanks for the links. ---
**Author:** ![GIGObuster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gigobuster/32/421_2.png) [@GIGObuster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GIGObuster)\ **Post date:** [November 27, 2014, 6:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/little-miss-muffet-revisited/705767/9 "2014-11-27T18:09:59Z")
I think the original did not have the clarity that was needed to identify if it was a grass bit or a footstool, one way to find with more precision what it was would be to see if the French word this was most likely to come from does refer to the furniture or the patch of grass. I thought also that one way to settle this one has to check how this was pictured in the past but as Wikipedia shows with 2 pictures from versions from the early 20th century the illustrators do not agree on what to pick. > **[Little Miss Muffet](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Little_Miss_Muffet)** > > "Little Miss Muffet" is an English nursery rhyme of uncertain origin, first recorded in 1805. It has a Roud Folk Song Index number of 20605. > The rhyme first appeared in print in Songs for the Nursery (1805), and there have been many variants since. The Oxford Dictionary of Nursery Rhymes gives the following: > Little Miss Muffet > Sat on a tuffet, > Eating her curds and whey; > There came a big spider, > Who sat down beside her > And frightened Miss Muffet away. ---
**Author:** ![GIGObuster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gigobuster/32/421_2.png) [@GIGObuster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GIGObuster)\ **Post date:** [November 27, 2014, 6:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/little-miss-muffet-revisited/705767/10 "2014-11-27T18:18:35Z")
It also seems to me that to confuse this more a tuft of grass and the meaning applied to furniture refer to a similar look: the look of material seemingly to come from specific points. So one describes how a bit of grass looks like and also can be used to describe the knitting points/shapes on the top of a footstool.