i know this is old… but i think everyone is getting their info wrong! it was bothering me very much.
okay… samclem, i’m not sure why you insist that everyone else’s theories are wrong. i know you did ‘research’ on the internet, but how reputable are these internet sources? are they from a scholarly journal?
as far as i know-- (and this is what my professor said who taught a class about GLBT issues)-- those who suggested that “faggot” originated from the witch burning times, and using homosexual men to fuel the fire… is correct. in fact, the stench of the burning flesh smelled so badly, people sprinkled PANSIES (the flower) all over the burning mass… which is how the word “pansy” got associated with homosexual men. Furthermore, the word FAG for cigarette also originates from this witch burning thing. ie: what do you do with a faggot? (a bundle of sticks…or homosexuel men…) … yes that’s right. you light it and burn it.
And as far as anyone who actually knows anything about the subject knows, it’s garbage, and your professor needs to have his credentials and/or his ethics checked. The original staff report has the story right.
Fact: Homosexuals were not punished by burning.
Fact: “Faggot” meaning “annoying animal” and “annoying woman” are well attested long before “faggot” meaning “homosexual”.
Fact: “Faggot” meaning “homosexual” first turns up in America in the 20th century.
At best, the “faggot”-from-burning theory is a wild guess without an atom of solid evidence to back it up. At worst, it’s a deliberate lie.
Italian for bassoon is: fagotto (fagotti is plural)
German for bassoon is: Das Fagott
Note spelling. In both cases, the accent falls on the second syllable.
It is still printed thusly in many editions of classical repertoire, in both scores and parts, which are printed in Europe.
In both languages, the original word meant a “bundle of sticks.” I suppose to some people, when the bassoon was developing as an instrument it did indeed resemble a bundle of sticks.
As for the “modern” meaning of faggot in English (spelled and pronounced differently than the above): being a bassoonist myself, I have endured no end of idiotic jokes about this.
as far as i know-- (and this is what my professor said who taught a class about GLBT issues)-- those who suggested that “faggot” originated from the witch burning times, and using homosexual men to fuel the fire… is correct. in fact, the stench of the burning flesh smelled so badly, people sprinkled PANSIES (the flower) all over the burning mass… which is how the word “pansy” got associated with homosexual men.
I’m afraid I have to discount everything your professor said after repeating this nonsensical piece of myth.
Ever smelled a pansy? Ever smelled a barbecue in progress?
I hate it when educators mindlessly repeat whatever they read. They should be retitled “readers”. /grump
Actually, the only ancient example of execution of men for the crime of sodomy would be the execution of one of the lovers of King Edward II of England. He was drawn (but not to death), hung (but not to death) (insert graphic pun here), castrated, and crucified - with his genitals burnt on a pyre in front of him. This severe application was commented on by contemporaries as particularly shocking, but no doubt inspired by the particular revulsion Ed’s political enemies felt at the power held by this man (and secondarily by the revulsion for a male king’s ‘mistress’).
Therefore, I’m in doubt that homosexuals were routinely burned. If executed, hanging a/o chopping the head is much more efficient - and safe, in town.
Not that Hugh Despenser is an exception, as he was being executed for treason, not sodomy, and the method used was simply the standard one for convicted traitors in medieval England.
IIRC, sodomy was a common law felony, and as such was punishable by hanging. (As mentioned, hanging, drawing and quartering was for male traitors, regardless of sexual persuasion.) I’m not aware of any offence other than heresy for which men were punished by burning alive in England. As John W. Kennedy says, homosexuals were not burned, and the whole “faggot from execution” theory is ludicrous.
If we can return to the column – I personally think that the Yiddish origin is likely, given the term’s American origin, and the large contribution that Yiddish has made to American English.
Follow-up to APB: I was under the impression that although hanging, drawing, etc. was the standard punishment for treason, it was custormary for the king to commute it to beheading for a nobleman convicted of treason, as an act of mercy.
Was Despenser executed prior to this becoming the standard practice, or was it because Mortimer & Isabella refused to agree to it in his particular case? In other words, did his relationship with Edward II contribute to his punishment by preventing him from the traditional mercy?
Can I just say that as a native-born Englishman who’s by no means badly read, I am very familiar with the use of “fag” to mean a junior boy at public school (English usage) who runs errands for a senior, but not “faggot”? I have, for instance, read Stalky & Co (Kipling) from cover to cover and seen many references to fags but none to faggots.
“Fag” also means “cigarette”, as stated, or “irksome task” (“it’s a fag having to write this out”) no doubt by association with the school usage, whence also “fagged out” (mildly exhausted). “Faggot” is synonymous with none of these.
Brit-side, “faggot” means “small savoury meatball, the composition of which you’re probably happier not knowing” or, more antiquated, “bundle of firewood” - the latter presumably from the Italian. IME, “faggot”=“homosexual” is considered an Americanism, though a widely understood one.
Yes, it was customary for the king to commute the punishment to beheading in cases involving a nobleman, but there was no requirement to do so and there were occasional exceptions. In the case of the Despensers, the executions were little more than judicial lynchings - the trial, held almost as soon as they had been captured, was highly irregular and they were executed the next day. The usual niceties didn’t apply. The method of execution is unlikely to have been a direct comment on Despenser’s sexuality, as his father, the Earl of Winchester, was also hung, drawn and quartered. Of course, all this did reflect their unpopularity which was indeed the result of Despenser’s relationship with Edward, but there was much more to their unpopularity than what they may or may not have been getting up to in bed. It rather misses the point to assume that Despenser was being executed because he was homosexual.
Rube, I’ve done some poking around. It looks like burning alive was the punishment for sodomy at common law in the medieval period, but Parliament made it a statutory felony during the Tudor period, and thereafter sodomy was potentially punished by death by hanging. Blackstone summarises the development of the law as follows:
This link quotes the passage from Britton that Blackstone refers to. It also suggests, citing the preamble to 25 Hen. VIII [1533], c. 6, that one of the reasons for the change may have been that the penalty of buring alive wasn’t being enforced because it was too severe. Personally, I’ve never thought that hanging was all that merciful a way to peg out either, but it seems to have made a difference back then…
But, getting back to our muttons, I would agree with you that the proposed etymology from the penalty of burning is silly. Even if the penalty for sodomy at common law prior to 1533 was burning alive, and even if that penalty was carried out at least occasionally, and even if faggots of sticks were used for that purpose prior to 1533, it seems quite a stretch to say that a folk memory of that penalty would lead to the appearance of “faggot” to mean homosexual nearly four centuries later, in 1914, the first noted instance of its use.
Hanging, if done properly (properly=a competent hangman that doesn’t intend to prolong the agony) isn’t that unpleasant as executions go - it breaks your neck at the base of your skull; you don’t last long in that condition. Then again, if the hangman does want to prolong the agony (notably when someone was to be hung, drawn, and quartered for high treason) he can make it very unpleasant.
Ahh, but you’re thinking of modern hanging, with a nice trapdoor, cleanly broken neck, etc. That’s not how it worked in medieval times. They tied the rope to the scaffold, looped it around your neck, and pushed you off the scaffold or ladder. No guarantee that your neck would break; more likely that you would just hang there, gradually suffocating; not uncommon for there to be involuntary evacuation of the bladder and bowels in the process. It was the accepted custom for friends of the condemned to pull on his legs and try and snap his neck, to speed up the death, but that wasn’t always allowed - and even that bit of “mercy” seems pretty painful for the person just hanging there, suffocating, and then having his legs pulled, which might snap his neck and end it, or perhaps just increase the strain and pain.
All told, a dirty and undignified death - which was one of the reasons it was used.
It may well be that Coke and Blackstone say that burning could be the penalty for witchcraft, but to the best of my knowledge, it wasn’t actually enforced for witchcraft simpliciter.
(You’ll notice how many people believe there were burnings at Salem…)
Ah, Northern, I’m kicking myself for not remembering that passage from Blackstone, difficult to parse though it is. As you say, though, I think we’re all in agreement that a * possible * pre 1500 English penalty did not result in a piece of 20th century American slang unknown in England. It does seem possible that someone once read that " in the Middle Ages homosexuals could be burned alive" and jumped to the “faggot” etymology without doing the research samclem did. (Of course, the idea of using human beings as fuel to burn witches is, well, bizarre.)