# Putang Pie **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [February 8, 2001, 11:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/putang-pie/53707 "2001-02-08T23:25:00Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 10\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Delila](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/58956e/32.png) [@Delila](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Delila)\ **Post date:** [February 8, 2001, 11:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/putang-pie/53707/1 "2001-02-08T23:25:00Z")
How did the vagina acquire the name “Putang Pie”? ---
**Author:** ![Fear\_Itself](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/fear_itself/32/19637_2.png) [@Fear\_Itself](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fear_Itself)\ **Post date:** [February 8, 2001, 11:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/putang-pie/53707/2 "2001-02-08T23:37:07Z")
I always heard it as **poontang** , and the [American Heritage Dictionary’s](http://www.bartleby.com/61/22/P0442250.html) take on it is thus: > [@](#): > > **poontang** > > SYLLABICATION: poon·tang > PRONUNCIATION: pn´tng´´ > > NOUN : 1. Vulgar Slang Sexual intercourse with a woman. 2. Offensive Slang Used as a disparaging term for a woman. > > ETYMOLOGY: Perhaps from French putain, prostitute, from Old French, from pute feminine of put, foul, stinking, from Latin ptidus, from ptre, to be rotten, stink. See p-. ---
**Author:** ![Johanna](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johanna/32/8318_2.png) [@Johanna](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johanna)\ **Post date:** [February 16, 2001, 4:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/putang-pie/53707/3 "2001-02-16T04:11:07Z")
I’m sorry, the _American Heritage Dictionary_’s etymologies have gone downhill from the first edition, when they really rocked. (Well, at least they included _poontang_ in the third edition; it didn’t appear in the first. “So, you have been looking for them, madame?”) “Stinking, rotten, foul …”? Oh, come on! I would say that reveals more about the etymologist’s state of mind than about the word itself! I think even their definition is somewhat off. The way I understood it, poontang refers primarily to the vulva. Using it to mean coitus would be a secondary derivation, like the way “pussy” is used. “Damn, I’m horny and I wanna get me some pussy!” The real etymology of French _putaine_, originally meaning ‘whore’, comes from Vulgar Latin _puttana_ (compare Spanish _putana_). That was derived from _puta_ or _putta_, originally meaning ‘girl’. (Yeah, I know it is not nice, let alone politically correct, to generalize girls as whores, but why do you think they call it “Vulgar Latin”? We’re talking about the Dark Ages here.) The Proto-World linguists see Latin _puta_ as derived from the primal word \*puti meaning ‘vulva’. They found cognates in words for vulva in languages all over the world, for example Hebrew _pot_ (“secret parts” in the King James Version, Isaiah 3:17); Tamil _puNTai_; Tulu _puTi_; Old Icelandic _fuð_; Malinke _butu_; Songhai _buti_; Old Japanese _photo_ (mod. _hoto_); Australian Aboriginal Luridya _puda_; Proto-Caucasian \*_put’i_; Basque _poto-rro_; Mohegan _se-bud_, etc. There are lots of other examples. ---
**Author:** ![StephenG](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/7feea3/32.png) [@StephenG](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/StephenG)\ **Post date:** [February 16, 2001, 10:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/putang-pie/53707/4 "2001-02-16T10:58:36Z")
_Here’s_ a thread I didn’t think I’d be replying to when I first opened it… I’d just like to quibble a little with the etymology here. > [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Jomo Mojo \* > \*\* The real etymology of French _putaine_, originally meaning ‘whore’, comes from Vulgar Latin _puttana_ (compare Spanish _putana_). That was derived from _puta_ or _putta_, originally meaning ‘girl’. \*\* The only meaning I’ve ever heard for _puta_ is whore. (It makes for an amusing misunderstanding when confused with _puja_ – meaning ‘push’ – when said to a woman in labor, but I digress.) ‘Girl’ was originally _puella_. > [@](#): > > (Yeah, I know it is not nice, let alone politically correct, to generalize girls as whores, but why do you think they call it “Vulgar Latin”? We’re talking about the Dark Ages here.) Um, no. “Vulgar Latin” is thusly called because it was the language of the people, aka the _vulgus_. We get ‘vulgar’ from the same source, but it doesn’t mean the same thing. ---
**Author:** ![Spritle](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/5daacb/32.png) [@Spritle](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spritle)\ **Post date:** [February 16, 2001, 12:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/putang-pie/53707/5 "2001-02-16T12:58:48Z")
I’ll just sit back and wait for this thread to meander its merry way towards “Gulliver’s Travels” and the title of one of the chapters. :humming: Hmmmmm.Hmmmmmmmm.Hmmmmmmmm ---
**Author:** ![screech-owl](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/82dd89/32.png) [@screech-owl](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/screech-owl)\ **Post date:** [February 16, 2001, 1:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/putang-pie/53707/6 "2001-02-16T13:35:04Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Holden MacRoyne \* > **…“Gulliver’s Travels”…title of one of the chapters…** For those of use who have never read this book, would you please hold the hum for a moment and elucidate? ---
**Author:** ![Celyn](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/9dc877/32.png) [@Celyn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Celyn)\ **Post date:** [February 16, 2001, 1:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/putang-pie/53707/7 "2001-02-16T13:45:45Z")
What **screech-owl** said! ---
**Author:** ![Kamino\_Neko](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kamino_neko/32/34_2.png) [@Kamino\_Neko](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kamino_Neko)\ **Post date:** [February 16, 2001, 1:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/putang-pie/53707/8 "2001-02-16T13:46:23Z")
One of the nations Gulliver visited was the floating island of Laputa. [Further thread-drift] Swift knew what it meant. That’s why he called it that. Hayao Miyazaki, on the other hand, didn’t, when he named his manga series Laputa: Castle in the Sky, after Swift’s floating island. If Disney ever gets around to releasing their translation of the movie based thereon (two years ago it was ‘coming soon’…bah!) it will, for obvious reasons, simply be titled Castle in the Sky. ---
**Author:** ![Celyn](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/9dc877/32.png) [@Celyn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Celyn)\ **Post date:** [February 16, 2001, 1:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/putang-pie/53707/9 "2001-02-16T13:52:55Z")
Thank you **Tengu**. Wouldn’t it be fun if Disney failed to notice, though? 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![Johanna](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johanna/32/8318_2.png) [@Johanna](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johanna)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2001, 3:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/putang-pie/53707/10 "2001-02-18T03:32:33Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by StephenG \* > **The only meaning I’ve ever heard for _puta_ is whore. … ‘Girl’ was originally _puella_.** _Puella_ would have been used by Cicero, but _putta_ was in fact Vulgar Latin for ‘girl’. Look, a lot of classical highfalutin Latin did not make it into the Romance languages (which originated from Vulgar Latin). For example, it was not _equus_ that survived in popular speech, but _caballus_. Compare with _putto_ meaning ‘boy’ in Italian (you know, the chubby boy angels painted by Michelangelo are called that–it’s just the masculinized form of _putta_). [quote] > [@](#): > > (Yeah, I know it is not nice, let alone politically correct, to generalize girls as whores, but why do you think they call it “Vulgar Latin”? We’re talking about the Dark Ages here.) > Um, no. “Vulgar Latin” is thusly called because it was the language of the people, aka the _vulgus_. We get ‘vulgar’ from the same source, but it doesn’t mean the same thing. \*\* I know that. _Duh_. I was making a joke.