Etymologically
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mud

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Pronunciation

Etymology

It is Middle English mudde, mode,[2][3] probably borrowed from Middle Low German mudde (“thick mud”) or Middle Dutch modde,[2][4][5][6] from Proto-Germanic *mud-,[4][2] cognate with Middle High German mot, bog, and Swedish modd.[2][5] Etymonline relates it to a PIE *(s)meu-, found in words for wet or dirty, such as Greek mydos, damp;[4] Barnhart compares Irish mothar, bog.[2] Welsh mwd is from English, and the older English word is fen.[4]

Earliest recorded meaning

Moist, soft earth: probably about 1380.[2][4]

Semantic evolution

Mud as a type of what is worthless or polluting is from 1563,[7] and the lowest or worst of anything from the 1580s.[4] The verb, to cover with mud, is from 1593.[3] Word Origins traces someone's name is mud to an 18th–19th-century slang use of mud for a stupid person,[8] and dates clear as mud to the early 19th century, drag through the mud to the mid-19th century and here's mud in your eye to the 1920s.[8] As hobo slang for coffee it is from 1925, and for opium from 1922.[4] Tracts of mud by a tidal river, muds, are from 1883.[7] A drilling mud, pumped down an oil well, is from 1901.[7]

Timeline

  • c. 1380 – mudde.[2]
  • 1563 – something worthless.[7]
  • 1593 – the verb.[3]
  • 1788 – mud pie.[4]
  • 1901 – drilling mud.[7]
  • 1925 – coffee (slang).[4]

Modern meaning

Noun

  1. Wet, sticky, soft earth, as after rain or on a riverbank.
  2. Wet plaster, mortar or cement.
  3. (informal) Slanderous charges: to sling mud.

Verb

  1. To cover or spatter with mud.

Word family

  • mudbug
  • mudcap
  • mudcat
  • muddy
  • mudfish
  • mudflat
  • mudflow
  • mudguard
  • muddle
  • mudlark
  • moss
  • fen

Usage notes

An unrelated MUD, an abbreviation of multi-user dungeon, is a text-based computer game for several players, from the late 20th century.[9][6] In northern English and Scots dialect a mud was a small nail used by shoemakers.[10]

References

  1. ^ Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
  2. ^ a b c d e f g Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
  3. ^ a b c Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
  4. ^ a b c d e f g h i Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
  5. ^ a b Hoad, T. F., ed. (1986), The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology, Oxford: Clarendon Press
  6. ^ a b Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
  7. ^ a b c d e Simpson, J. A.; Weiner, E. S. C., eds. (1989), The Oxford English Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Clarendon Press
  8. ^ a b Cresswell, Julia (2021), Oxford Dictionary of Word Origins, 3rd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
  9. ^ Pearsall, Judy, ed. (1998), The New Oxford Dictionary of English, Oxford: Clarendon Press
  10. ^ Wright, Joseph, ed. (1898–1905), The English Dialect Dictionary, 6 vols., Oxford: Henry Frowde; via EDD Online 4.0, University of Innsbruck (CC BY 4.0)