Dogged Pursuit

     Occasionally, a meeting delay can be a good thing. 

    I keep the book, Useless Etymology within easy reach on my desk. I enjoy stories about word origins. I've now and again incorporated a few of them into blogs. Useless Etymology offers short snippets on a variety of words. The book is entertaining and easy to set aside when the other meeting participants sign on to their computers. 

    Last Monday, while I waited for the meeting to kick off, my attention wandered to the backstory for the word, feisty. 

Blackoranges, Public Domain

    I like the imagery evoked by feisty. The Cambridge Dictionary defines the word as "active, forceful, full of determination." For me, it brings to mind a creature who is spunky. Sometimes I get an image of Muffin, the dog down the street that is always ready to defend her property line. At other times I picture an indomitable elderly individual--the kind of character who might get cast in The Thursday Murder Club. 

    Delving into its origins, I learned that in the 19th Century, a feist did, in fact, refer to a small dog. (If you've ever been cussed out by a Pomeranian, you see the connection.) In "The Bear Hunt," a poem composed by Abraham Lincoln, he refers to a feist (although he spelled it fice.)

    Feisty has always been a descriptor for dogs. 

    But here is where the etymology grabbed my attention. Feist comes from the Middle English phrase fysting curre or feisting cur. Most people recognize cur as a synonym for a dog. Feisting means to break wind. (Fizzle has the same root.)

    To be feisty than is to be a stinking, flatulent, little dog. 

    Muffin's mom would be horrified if she knew. 

    Useless Etymology cites an 1811 source that discussed how feist and dog became thoroughly merged. Picture a group of 19th-Century, high-society women sitting in the parlor, sharing tea. Each socialite had a small dog planted on her lap. If someone accidentally broke wind, the dog would be available to assume the gastrointestinal blame. 

    Like many words throughout the English language, the archaic definition of feisty has fallen away. The word became more associated with other characteristics of small-breed dogs and then moved on to other creatures. Still, the next time you're watching ESPN and a commentator describes the underdog team as being feisty, I hope you'll wonder if there is, by chance, an alternative reason why the team can't wait to get out of the locker room and back on the field. 

    Bonus Etymology:

    As a related linguistic tangent, I found aske-fiske, a now-obsolete English term for a fire-tender. It dates from around the 15th Century and literally means ash blower. According to Etymonline, an online etymology source, aske-fiske often described a bellows rather than a human tasked with the job. I'll let you make the connection between flatulence and a bellows. Some war-like Norse clans also used the term for a cowardly fellow who preferred sitting in the corner by the fireplace than pillaging among the neighbors. 

    At last Monday's meeting, the other participants eventually appeared. I started the meeting with a smile on my face. Fortunately, everyone behaved themselves. If someone in the meeting had acted feisty, I might have fallen out of my chair. 

    Until next time.