# The word 'faggot' origination **URL:** \ **Category:** Cecil's Columns/Staff Reports\ **Created:** [September 25, 2012, 9:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-word-faggot-origination/635759 "2012-09-25T09:56:15Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 14\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Luk3112](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/a9adbd/32.png) [@Luk3112](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Luk3112)\ **Post date:** [September 25, 2012, 9:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-word-faggot-origination/635759/1 "2012-09-25T09:56:15Z")
I thought a faggot was a pile of sticks used in old times to burn homosexuals. Is this true? ---
**Author:** ![DrFidelius](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/drfidelius/32/3447_2.png) [@DrFidelius](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrFidelius)\ **Post date:** [September 25, 2012, 10:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-word-faggot-origination/635759/2 "2012-09-25T10:14:54Z")
No. ---
**Author:** ![Ken001](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/43a26b/32.png) [@Ken001](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ken001)\ **Post date:** [September 25, 2012, 10:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-word-faggot-origination/635759/3 "2012-09-25T10:16:01Z")
Yes indeed, but we don’t talk about that in polite company. ---
**Author:** ![tellyworth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/977dab/32.png) [@tellyworth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tellyworth)\ **Post date:** [September 25, 2012, 10:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-word-faggot-origination/635759/4 "2012-09-25T10:47:46Z")
[column from 2003](http://www.straightdope.com/columns/read/2112/how-did-faggot-get-to-mean-male-homosexual). ---
**Author:** ![samclem](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a9a28c/32.png) [@samclem](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/samclem)\ **Post date:** [September 25, 2012, 11:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-word-faggot-origination/635759/5 "2012-09-25T11:19:40Z")
Moved from General Questions to \*Comments on Cecil’s Columns/Staff Reports. **samclem** , moderator. ---
**Author:** ![Luk3112](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/a9adbd/32.png) [@Luk3112](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Luk3112)\ **Post date:** [September 25, 2012, 2:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-word-faggot-origination/635759/6 "2012-09-25T14:39:39Z")
> [@samclem](#): > > Moved from General Questions to \*Comments on Cecil’s Columns/Staff Reports. > > **samclem** , moderator. This isnt a comment on one of his reports, but fair enough I didnt see he’d done one. ---
**Author:** ![janeslogin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/df788c/32.png) [@janeslogin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/janeslogin)\ **Post date:** [September 25, 2012, 10:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-word-faggot-origination/635759/7 "2012-09-25T22:15:31Z")
Quinion, widely respected among etymologists says: "In the sixteenth century, faggot took on associations of being burnt at the stake as a heretic, especially in the phrase fire and faggot. " Later says "The homosexual sense began to appear in Britain in the 1960s … " [World Wide Words: Faggot](http://www.worldwidewords.org/qa/qa-fag1.htm) ---
**Author:** ![John\_W.Kennedy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_w.kennedy/32/1031_2.png) [@John\_W.Kennedy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_W.Kennedy)\ **Post date:** [September 25, 2012, 11:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-word-faggot-origination/635759/8 "2012-09-25T23:05:16Z")
And homosexuals are not heretics _per se_ and there is no evidence of people being burnt being _called_ “faggots”. And, no, the 16th-century idiom “to fry a faggot” is not a case in point; it meant to _be_ burned at the stake, because “fry” at that date meant what we would now qualify as “deep-fat frying”; if you were burned, the fat in your body would liquify and drench—fry—the actual wooden faggots burning under you—or at least it was so imagined. ---
**Author:** ![jmrcm](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/7c8e57/32.png) [@jmrcm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jmrcm)\ **Post date:** [September 26, 2012, 12:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-word-faggot-origination/635759/9 "2012-09-26T00:44:51Z")
> [@Luk3112](#): > > I thought a faggot was a pile of sticks used in old times to burn homosexuals. > > Is this true? Whether homosexuals were burned at the stake in olden times, I do not know. But faggot is definitely a bundle of sticks, for use in kindling or whatever you like. The word fag is still in use in England to mean a cigarette. People in England say, “I’m just popping outside to smoke a fag”. And they mean they’re going outside to smoke a cigarette. ---
**Author:** ![Peter\_Morris](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/peter_morris/32/359_2.png) [@Peter\_Morris](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Peter_Morris)\ **Post date:** [September 26, 2012, 7:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-word-faggot-origination/635759/10 "2012-09-26T07:30:10Z")
> [@Sam's staff report](#): > > Nineteenth century Britons also heard “faggot” used in reference to an ill-tempered woman, i.e., a ball-buster, a battleaxe, a shrew…The relationship, if any, between faggot-as-bundle-of-sticks and faggot-as-shrewish-woman is unknown. Sam, here’s a possible origin in a [dictionary from 1835](http://books.google.co.uk/books?id=vulBAAAAYAAJ&lpg=PA202&ots=khIDa_VdgN&dq=faggot%20intitle%3Adictionary&pg=PA202#v=onepage&q=faggot%20intitle:dictionary&f=false) \* Faggot : A term of contempt for a dry, shriveled old woman, whose bones are, like a bundle of sticks, fit only to burn, \* Does that help? Actually, I’m not sure what that means. Her bones are fit to burn? in what way? I wonder if there’s a superfluous comma there. A shriveled old woman whose bones are \*like \*a bundle of sticks. That makes a bit more sense. What’s your expert opinion on this, Sam? ---
**Author:** ![Luk3112](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/a9adbd/32.png) [@Luk3112](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Luk3112)\ **Post date:** [September 26, 2012, 8:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-word-faggot-origination/635759/11 "2012-09-26T08:20:44Z")
> [@jmrcm](#): > > Whether homosexuals were burned at the stake in olden times, I do not know. > > But faggot is definitely a bundle of sticks, for use in kindling or whatever you like. The word fag is still in use in England to mean a cigarette. > > People in England say, “I’m just popping outside to smoke a fag”. And they mean they’re going outside to smoke a cigarette. yup im english, I say that, just goin for a fag bruv. ---
**Author:** ![Ken001](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/43a26b/32.png) [@Ken001](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ken001)\ **Post date:** [September 26, 2012, 11:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-word-faggot-origination/635759/12 "2012-09-26T11:14:01Z")
> [@Luk3112](#): > > yup im english, I say that, just goin for a fag bruv. Or a durrie. ---
**Author:** ![samclem](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a9a28c/32.png) [@samclem](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/samclem)\ **Post date:** [September 26, 2012, 11:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-word-faggot-origination/635759/13 "2012-09-26T11:23:44Z")
> [@Peter\_Morris](#): > > Sam, here’s a possible origin in a [dictionary from 1835](http://books.google.co.uk/books?id=vulBAAAAYAAJ&lpg=PA202&ots=khIDa_VdgN&dq=faggot%20intitle%3Adictionary&pg=PA202#v=onepage&q=faggot%20intitle:dictionary&f=false) > \* > Faggot : A term of contempt for a dry, shriveled old woman, whose bones are, like a bundle of sticks, fit only to burn, \* > > Does that help? > Actually, I’m not sure what that means. Her bones are fit to burn? in what way? I wonder if there’s a superfluous comma there. A shriveled old woman whose bones are \*like \*a bundle of sticks. That makes a bit more sense. What’s your expert opinion on this, Sam? That dictionary is actually 1883(5). Typical Google false hit for the date. I don’t see anything wrong with the way it was written. The author used the correct definitions(mainly in England at that time). Why he needed to add a rather misogynistic comment like “whose bones are…fit only to burn,” is rather strange. ---
**Author:** ![John\_W.Kennedy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_w.kennedy/32/1031_2.png) [@John\_W.Kennedy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_W.Kennedy)\ **Post date:** [September 26, 2012, 11:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-word-faggot-origination/635759/14 "2012-09-26T23:48:51Z")
> [@samclem](#): > > That dictionary is actually 1883(5). Typical Google false hit for the date. > > I don’t see anything wrong with the way it was written. The author used the correct definitions(mainly in England at that time). Why he needed to add a rather misogynistic comment like “whose bones are…fit only to burn,” is rather strange. Well, we don’t know who the misogynist is—a lexicographer must take words as he finds them. But since he gives no source, we cannot know whether the connection is anything but a wild guess on his part. At any rate, the fact that “faggot” did have, in the 19th century, a connection with old women that was almost ready made for transferring to gay men is well established. (It was also applied to any animal that happened to be annoying the speaker at the moment, such as a cow standing in the middle of a gate the speaker wanted to go through.)