From The Canting Crew to The Army of the Potomac Part II

What is the strumpet to which Samuel Johnson refers in last week's post? It’s nothing to do with trumpets or crumpets. It’s another word for a prostitute or harlot. Its origin is also unclear, but according to etymonline.com

One theory connects it with Latin struprata, [the] feminine past participle of stuprare “have illicit sexual relations with,” or [the] Late Latin strumpum “dishonor, violation.” Others suggest Middle Dutch strompe, “a stocking,” or strompen “to stride, to stalk” (as a prostitute might a customer). The major sources don’t seem to give much preference to any of these. Weekley notes “Gregory’s Chronicle (c. 1450) has streppett in [the] same sense.”

Harlot, now a synonym for prostitute, also had a less negative original meaning. (Makes one wonder why we devolved so many different words for prostitute.) When it came to English in about 1200 it referred to a vagabond or rogue or a man with no fixed occupation. It came to English from the Old French word herlot or arlot, the equivalent of our hobo. Chaucer also used this word, both in a positive and in a pejorative sense. By the 15^th century it developed its use to describe a woman of ill repute, a sense reinforced and solidified by its use in 16^th century translations of the Bible. Etymonline says it may be Germanic if its first element is derived from hari, the word for “army.” But how it changed from army to vagabond to prostitute doesn’t seem like a natural progression to me.

While we’re on the prostitute thing, a common word in America for prostitute is hooker, and its etymology bears recounting. A popular story is that it was due to the poor morality of General “Fighting Joe” Hooker’s men in the Army of the Potomac during the American Civil War, in early 1863. But about 1845 it was used in a letter warning against “…any number of pretty Hookers in the Brick row not far from French’s hotel” in Norfolk, Virginia. But it was also used to refer to a resident of Corlear’s Hook in the New York City in 1859, many of which were employed in a number of houses of ill-repute frequented by sailors. At any rate, no matters its earlier usages the word hooker came to refer to a prostitute in the 1800s.

Another interesting word is succubus, and while it is another word for a prostitute it also has an interesting etymology with a retained meaning. It is a late 14^th century alteration of the Late Latin word succuba, which was used of a female demon who would have intercourse with men in their sleep. The Latin word was formed by combining the prefix sub-, which still means under as it did in ancient Rome, with cubare, which means to lie down. The combination formed the word succubare, which meant “to lie under.”  Succubus is still used for this demon.

Some day we’ll get to nice words for women. Maybe for Mother’s Day.