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Etymology and origin of the English word puss

English has two nouns spelled puss: one for the cat, of uncertain origin, and a slang word for the face or mouth, from Irish.[1][2][3]

Pronunciation

puss1 cat

Confidence
Disputed
Formation
Borrowing
First attested
1533 J. Heywood, Johan Johan
Borrowed from
Middle Low German pūs

Etymology

The word for the cat is probably borrowed from Middle Low German pūs (“cat”), also pūskatte, or from Dutch poes,[5][6][7][1] but Merriam-Webster Unabridged calls its origin unknown,[3] and the revised OED treats it instead as an apparently native Germanic word, cognate with the Dutch word (recorded from 1561 as puis), Middle Low German pūse, Low German Puus, Danish pus and regional Swedish katte-pus.[2] Its further origin is uncertain; it may simply represent a call to attract a cat,[2][1][8][9] or imitate a cat's hissing or spitting.[10][11] Similar words are used far beyond Germanic: Lithuanian puž, a call to a cat,[2][5] Irish puisín (“kitten”),[2][10] Romanian pisică (“cat”) and Albanian piso,[11][10] and Weekley and Etymonline note it even in Afghanistan.[12][10] The OED rejects the idea that the original sense was "soft mass", the meaning of Dutch poes in another use.[2] Weekley cites a man named Robert Pusekat in a Northumberland assize roll of 1256, a sign that the word is older than the dictionaries' first records.[12]

Earliest recorded meaning

A conventional name for a cat, also used as a call to it: 1533, in J. Heywood's play Johan Johan.[2] Barnhart dates the word to before 1530 and Etymonline to the 1520s;[8][10] Merriam-Webster Unabridged has 1598 for the sense "cat".[3]

Semantic evolution

As an ordinary noun for a cat, puss was at first a nursery word (1598, in Florio).[2] It was also used for a hare from 1575, in Gascoigne's treatise on hunting,[2][13] a sense now regional, current in Scotland and the north of England in the 19th century.[2][14] From about 1600 it was applied to a girl or woman, at first with the implication of a cat's spite or slyness, but by the mid-19th century affectionately.[10][2][6] Johnson (1755) called it "the fondling name of a cat" and knew no origin for it.[15] A children's game called puss, in which a player in the centre tries to take another's place, is recorded from 1709,[2] and humorous use for big cats dates from 1837.[2] Since 1942, chiefly in North America, it has also been applied to a gentle, soft-hearted or weak man.[2] A verb, to move stealthily like a cat, is recorded from 1953, in D. Thomas.[2] The derivative pussy is from 1726.[8][6]

Timeline

  • 1533 – a name for a cat, used as a call.[2]
  • 1575 – a hare.[2][13]
  • 1598 – a cat (nursery and colloquial use).[2][3]
  • 1602 – a girl or woman, at first disparagingly.[2][10]
  • 1709 – a children's game of changing places.[2]
  • 1766 – the puss moth.[2]
  • 1837 – humorously, a big cat.[2]
  • 1942 – a soft-hearted or weak man.[2]
  • before 1953 – verb, to move stealthily like a cat.[2]

Meanings

Noun

  1. (informal) A cat, or a pet name for one: The old puss slept by the stove.[16][3][2]
  2. A girl or young woman, or a child, usually in affection or mild reproach.[3][16][2]
  3. (dialect, British) A hare.[3][16][2]

Word family

  • pusslike
  • puss in the corner

puss2 face, mouth

Confidence
Established
Formation
Borrowing
First attested
1844 American Turf Register
Borrowed from
Irish pus
Ultimate origin
Middle Irish bus

Etymology

The word for the face or mouth is borrowed from Irish pus (“lip, mouth”),[2][3][10][5][9][17] a variant of bus, from Middle Irish bus (“lip”),[2][3][9][1] probably imitative in origin according to Merriam-Webster Unabridged.[3] The OED notes the Irish word in a derogatory sense from the mid-16th century and its derivative pusach, having prominent lips, from the 14th; it finds the further origin uncertain and compares a name element Gaulish bussu-, probably meaning "lip".[2] Merriam-Webster Unabridged relates it to buss, a kiss.[3]

Earliest recorded meaning

A person's face or mouth: 1844, in the American Turf Register.[2][3] Etymonline dates it to 1890,[10] and Green's Dictionary of Slang's first record, in Maitland's American Slang Dictionary of 1891, is a prize-ring term for the mouth.[13]

Semantic evolution

In boxing slang the word meant especially the mouth, the target of a blow.[10][13][5] From 1899, in S. MacManus, it was also a sour or sulky look, a pout,[2][14] the sense of the compound sourpuss.[2] In Irish English the word, also spelled pus, is the mouth or a pout, and a verb to puss means to sulk.[17] The Shorter Oxford calls it chiefly Anglo-Irish and North American.[5]

Timeline

  • 1844 – a person's face or mouth.[2][3]
  • 1891 – in prize-fighting, the mouth.[13]
  • 1899 – a sulky expression, a pout.[2][14]

Meanings

Noun

  1. (slang) The face: He got a punch in the puss.[3][2][5]
  2. (slang) The mouth.[2][13][5]
  3. (chiefly Irish) A sulky expression; a pout.[2][17]

Word family

  • sourpuss

References

  1. ^ a b c d Ayto, John (2005), Word Origins: The Secret Histories of English Words from A to Z, 2nd ed., London: A & C Black
  2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s t u v w x y z 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
  3. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
  4. ^ Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
  5. ^ a b c d e f g Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
  6. ^ a b c Hoad, T. F., ed. (1986), The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology, Oxford: Clarendon Press
  7. ^ Stevenson, Angus, ed. (2010), Oxford Dictionary of English, 3rd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
  8. ^ a b c Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
  9. ^ a b c The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (online 2024), 5th ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
  10. ^ a b c d e f g h i j Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
  11. ^ a b Klein, Ernest. A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the English Language. 2 vols. Amsterdam: Elsevier, 1966–1967.
  12. ^ a b Weekley, Ernest (1921), An Etymological Dictionary of Modern English, London: John Murray
  13. ^ a b c d e f Green, Jonathon (2010), Green's Dictionary of Slang, London: Chambers; digital ed. 2016–, https://greensdictofslang.com
  14. ^ a b c 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)
  15. ^ Johnson, Samuel (1755), A Dictionary of the English Language, London; 4th ed. 1773; Johnson's Dictionary Online, ed. Beth Rapp Young et al.
  16. ^ a b c Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins
  17. ^ a b c Dolan, Terence Patrick (2004), A Dictionary of Hiberno-English: The Irish Use of English, 2nd ed., Dublin: Gill & Macmillan

Related etymologies

  • trousers · also from Irish
  • puck · also from Irish
  • punt · also from Irish
  • slew · also from Irish
  • bog · also from Irish
  • twig · also from Irish
  • maw · also from Irish
  • banshee · also from Irish
Cite this entry

“Puss.” Etymologically, 8 Nov. 2026, etymologically.com/en/puss. Accessed 9 Nov. 2026.

Last edited on . ·