"Nutter, Nuthead, Nutjob" - Etymological Question

[MatthewGerlach]

The title pretty much says it all. What’s the origin of the expression “He’s a nutter/nutjob/nuthead”, in the sense of calling someone crazy?

[samclem]

You need to start with the meaning of “nut” to indicate the head.

@OED

12. colloq.

    a. The head.

1841 H. J. MERCIER & W. GALLOP Life in Man-of-War 175 Who ever thought you had so much poetry in that woolly nut of yours. 1846 Swell’s Night Guide 76 Why, she’s getting groggy on her pins, and if you don’t pipe rumbo, she’ll go prat over nut (head over heels). 1858 A. S. MAYHEW Paved with Gold II. xii. 189 The first round was soon terminated, for Jack got a ‘cracker on his nut’. 1909 J. R. WARE Passing Eng. 114/2 When a gent puts a donkey’s breakfast a-top of his nut.

From that meaning, it’s only a short hop to making a disparaging remark about someone who is slightly “off” “crazy” etc.

@OED

b. off one’s nut: out of one’s mind, insane, crazy (see also quot. 1860).

1858 H. J. BYRON Mazeppa (BL Add. MS 52977 H) V. f. 78, If this goes on much longer I shall cut In the vernacular she’s ‘off her nut’. 1860 Slang Dict. (ed. 2) 182 To be ‘off one’s nut’, to be in liquor [1873 ed. 4 to be crazed or idiotic].
adj.2 colloq. (orig. U.S.). Mad, crazy, stupid, eccentric. Cf. sense A. 7a and compounds at Compounds 1a.

1906 Amer. Mag. Feb. 406/2 And you mean to say, Dan, that you’re nut enough to think this? 1918 Stars & Stripes 29 Mar. 3/2 The gink who used to write nut-stuff by order for frivolous night city editors to gloat over and kill can occasionally deliver himself of a serious contributionunder threat. 1922 U. SINCLAIR They call me Carpenter xix. 66, I just want to know where he got his nut ideas.

[Sofis]

Might the original nut related term for someone crazy possibly be “nutcase”? A nut case (as opposed to a nut in its case) is something hollow, making the connection to mental deficiency a short step, especially when combined with “nut” as a term for “head” as shown by samclem. The other terms could have been derived from “nutcase”.

[Blake]

@Sofis

Might the original nut related term for someone crazy possibly be “nutcase”? A nut case (as opposed to a nut in its case) is something hollow, making the connection to mental deficiency a short step, especially when combined with “nut” as a term for “head” as shown by samclem. The other terms could have been derived from “nutcase”.

“Nut case”, AFAIK, is just a variation of “head case”. Literally meaning medical cases that are related to the head (cf “mental case”). I see nor reason to ascribe any different origin to “nut case”. It’s just another case where “nut” has been substituted for “head”.

I’d have to see some evidence before I believed that “nut case” has ever referred to a nutshell. I have never, ever seen or heard it used that way.