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  • Que?

    November 3, 2007

  • 1. a small bunch of flowers or herbs.

    2. a cone-shaped holder for a bouquet.

    Also called tussie-mussie.

    (From dictionary.com)

    November 3, 2007

  • Tuzzy-muzzy has quite a different meaning in the Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue (1811): "the monosyllable." When you look under monosyllable, it's defined as "a woman's commodity."

    September 5, 2008

  • Haha! How did it take on such a vastly different meaning from tussie-mussie, I wonder?

    September 5, 2008

  • I'm guessing, based on the other stuff in the book, that certain people... I don't want to call them vulgar... took an existing term and gave it a more subversive... I don't want to say vulgar... meaning. I mean, that's usually the case in the book. Occasionally there are original words or phrases but a lot of times they're just adaptations of existing words.

    OED does not list tussy-mussy, but it does list tussy: "A cluster, posy, or knot of flowers or leaves; an ornament of silver or gold of this form, forming a buckle or the like."

    OED, interestingly, lists tuzzy-muzzy as the main spelling and tussie-mussie as a modern variant: "A bunch or posy of flowers, a nosegay; a garland of flowers. Also fig. Revived in 20th cent., usu. in form tussie-mussie."

    Additional meanings:

    "As popular name of particular plants or flowers (see quots.); also, a bur."

    "Dishevelled, ragged; fuzzy. dial."

    And the third meaning (I post them here out of order): "See quots. slang. Obs.

    1711 E. WARD Quix. I. 70 And Salt as Lot's Wife's Tuzzy~muzzy. 1721 BAILEY, Tuzzimuzzy,..a jocular Name for the Pudendum Muliebre. Hence in HALLIWELL, and in later Dicts."

    It offers 9 usage examples of the first definition (beginning in 1440!) before the date of the 1st usage of it as a vulgar term in 1711.

    September 5, 2008

  • Hmm. I suppose I can see it now....

    *looks away*

    September 5, 2008