# Origin of "spittin image" **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [April 18, 2002, 1:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/origin-of-spittin-image/104238 "2002-04-18T01:28:08Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 8\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Barking\_Spider](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/9dc877/32.png) [@Barking\_Spider](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Barking_Spider)\ **Post date:** [April 18, 2002, 1:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/origin-of-spittin-image/104238/1 "2002-04-18T01:28:08Z")
Some guy told me today that the origin of “spittin image” is actually “spirit and image”, which, because of Southern drawl, evolved into “spittin image”. Was he right? ---
**Author:** ![samclem](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a9a28c/32.png) [@samclem](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/samclem)\ **Post date:** [April 18, 2002, 2:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/origin-of-spittin-image/104238/2 "2002-04-18T02:00:31Z")
For whatever reason, I can’t bring this one up on “search” although I know that we have done it befoe. > [@](#): > > Larry Horn, Professor of Linguistics at Yale, argues convincingly that the original form was actually spitten image, using the old dialectal past participle form of spit. He suggests that the phrase was reinterpreted when that form went out of use, first as spit ‘n’ image and then as spit and image or spitting image. This is the best current theory. From [http://www.worldwidewords.org/qa/qa-spi1.htm](http://www.worldwidewords.org/qa/qa-spi1.htm) ---
**Author:** ![Surreal](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/eada6e/32.png) [@Surreal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Surreal)\ **Post date:** [April 18, 2002, 2:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/origin-of-spittin-image/104238/3 "2002-04-18T02:05:07Z")
This is just a guess. Aren’t some of the prizes in Cracker Jacks boxes ‘tattoos’ that are transferred to the skin by the applying water, or in the case of every child who ever used them, SPIT, to the paper and then pressing it onto the skin? ---
**Author:** ![Ruby](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/13edae/32.png) [@Ruby](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ruby)\ **Post date:** [April 18, 2002, 2:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/origin-of-spittin-image/104238/4 "2002-04-18T02:25:21Z")
> [@](#): > > _as quoted from **2107 Curious Word Origins, Sayings & Expressions** by Charles Earle Funk (editor-in-chief of the Funk & Wagnalls Standard Dictionary Series so it has to be true!)_ > \ the expression is partly English and partly American. The records show that "spit,’ in such form as “the spit of his father,” was used in England early in the nineteenth century. It seems certain that the origin of the noun in this sense was derived from an earlier use of the verb, going back over some two hundred years, for earlier records show such expressions as, “as like (a person) as if spit out of his mouth.” > > “Image” seem to have been a redundancy added in America. It was not needed, and only serves to intensify the close resemblance which the speaker observes. All this time I thought it was another way to say “the apple doesn’t fall far from the tree” making the connection that one never really gets too far away from his spit. Sheesh, learn something new every day. ---
**Author:** ![Motog](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/85e7bf/32.png) [@Motog](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Motog)\ **Post date:** [April 18, 2002, 2:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/origin-of-spittin-image/104238/5 "2002-04-18T02:52:50Z")
The Word Detective [http://www.word-detective.com/052598.html#spittin](http://www.word-detective.com/052598.html#spittin) says > [@](#): > > “spitting image” or “spittin’ image,” meaning “exact likeness” and it’s based on an earlier form, “spit and image,” which first appeared around 1859 Just where the phrase came from and exactly what it means, however, is hotly debated in etymological circles. > > Most authorities accept the “spit” element of the phrase at face value, and maintain that it is a remarkably inelegant metaphor for similarity: “just as if one person were spit out of another’s mouth.” A similar saying in French, “C’est son pere tout crache” (“He is his father’s spit and image”), lends support to this theory, as do earlier English sayings with the same meaning, such as “the very spit of,” which appeared around 1825 ---
**Author:** ![bibliophage](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bibliophage/32/7615_2.png) [@bibliophage](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bibliophage)\ **Post date:** [April 18, 2002, 4:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/origin-of-spittin-image/104238/6 "2002-04-18T04:35:22Z")
[Straight Dope Staff Report: What’s the origin of “spitting image”?](http://www.straightdope.com/mailbag/mspittinimage.html) ---
**Author:** ![samclem](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a9a28c/32.png) [@samclem](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/samclem)\ **Post date:** [April 18, 2002, 4:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/origin-of-spittin-image/104238/7 "2002-04-18T04:44:50Z")
Thanks **bib**. Ken would be advised to look at William and Mary Morris’ book last. It is a bit out of date on a lot of things, and quite often represents their _opinions_, not scholarly research. And now I understand why I can’t find the previous link. It must have been done in the great board crash. ---
**Author:** ![jcdevildog](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/d26b3c/32.png) [@jcdevildog](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jcdevildog)\ **Post date:** [August 25, 2002, 5:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/origin-of-spittin-image/104238/8 "2002-08-25T05:32:10Z")
I’ve heard people in my region (western North Carolina) remark that a child resembles a parent so much “it’s as if he/she spit him/her out of his/her mouth”, which would certainly support the idea that “spit” does in fact mean spit. It seems like an oblique suggestion of some kind of parthenogenesis–that is, the child is so much like that parent that no one else seems to have a part in her/him. My religious concepts are somewhat foggy, but don’t some cultures hold the idea that humans were created by a divine being who formed them out of earth or clay moistened by the deity’s saliva? In that case, “spit” and “spirit” would be essentially the same thing.