squash

squash¹ crush; the drink and the game

Etymology

The verb meaning to crush is inherited from Middle English squachen,^[5][1][2] borrowed from Old French esquacher, a variant of esquasser and escachier (“to crush, shatter, destroy, break”),^[5][2][6] from Vulgar Latin *exquassō,^[1][2][7][8] formed from ex- (“out”) and quassō (“to shatter”),^[1][2] the frequentative of quatiō (“to shake”),^[7][8] from Proto-Indo-European *kwēt- (“to shake”).^[7] The Anglo-Norman verb esquasser, recorded from the third quarter of the 12th century, already meant to shatter, crush, squash and wipe out.^[9] The same Latin source gave quash,^[1][2][8] and the English word may have been partly conformed to it;^[2][10][11] the Shorter Oxford calls squash an expressive alteration of quash,^[12] and the OED thinks some senses may be partly or mainly imitative.^[6][2] Wiktionary traces esquacher instead to *excoāctiō, with esquasser only influencing it.^[4]

Earliest recorded meaning

Barnhart dates squachen to before 1325, meaning to annul, to shoot, to destroy or crush;^[1] the Middle English Dictionary's first quotation, of about 1390, has to smash or crush (a tower), and it also records the senses to annul a writ and to shoot a crossbow bolt.^[5] The OED dates "to squeeze or crush into a flat mass" from 1565.^[6][3]

Semantic evolution

The noun first named something soft and unripe: in 1590 Shakespeare's A Midsummer Night's Dream has squash for an unripe pea pod,^[1][3][6] and Johnson (1755) quoted Twelfth Night for anything soft and easily crushed.^[13] From 1611 the noun meant the act or sound of squashing,^[6][2] and, from 1654, the impact of a soft heavy body falling.^[6] The verb was used from about 1777 for suppressing or putting down,^[6] and, from 1858, for being flattened on impact.^[6] The sense "something crushed" gave the drink, as in lemon squash, recorded in 1888;^[1][2] Collins labels the fruit drink British.^[14] The game took its name from the soft rubber ball, called a squash at Harrow by 1886;^[6][1][2] the game itself was squash or squash rackets by 1899,^[6][2] and American English had squash tennis by 1901.^[1] A crowded gathering of people was a squash from 1884, and a social meeting from 1904.^[6] In Scotland and parts of England the verb meant to splash or dash water about.^[15] In recent American slang, to squash a quarrel is to put an end to it.^[16]

Timeline

• before 1325 – squachen, to annul, destroy, crush.^[1]
• c. 1390 – to smash or crush something (MED's first quotation).^[5]
• 1565 – to squeeze or crush into a flat mass.^[6][3]
• 1590 – noun, an unripe pea pod, in Shakespeare.^[1][3]
• 1611 – the act or sound of squashing.^[6]
• 1671 – to move with a splashing sound.^[6]
• 1766 – adverb, with a squash.^[6][3]
• c. 1777 – to suppress or put down.^[6]
• 1886 – the soft rubber ball of a racket game.^[6][1]
• 1888 – something squashed, as in lemon squash.^[1]
• 1899 – the game of squash rackets.^[6][2]

Meanings

Verb

1. To press or squeeze something into a flat mass or a pulp; to crush: She squashed the wasp with a rolled-up magazine.^[14][3][6]
2. To put down or suppress: The rumour was squashed within a day.^[14][3][6]
3. To silence or humiliate a person, especially with a cutting reply.^[14]
4. To force into a small space; to crowd or pack tightly: Five of us squashed into the back seat.^[14][12]
5. To make a sucking or squelching sound, or to move with such a sound.^[14][6]
6. To be flattened or crushed under pressure or on impact.^[6][14]

Noun

1. (British) A drink made from fruit juice or syrup diluted with water: orange squash.^[14][3]
2. A game for two or four players with rackets and a small soft ball, played in a walled court; squash rackets.^[6][2]
3. A crowd of people in a confined space; a crush.^[14][6]
4. Something squashed; a crushed mass.^[14][3][6]
5. The sound or impact of a soft heavy body falling, or a squelching sound.^[3][6]
6. (obsolete) Something soft and easily crushed, especially an unripe pea pod.^[3][6][13]

Word family

• squasher
• squashy
• squash rackets
• squash tennis
• squash ball

squash² vegetable

Etymology

The vegetable is a shortening of the Narragansett word askutasquash,^{[2][1][12][17]} which Etymonline and Barnhart gloss as "the green things that may be eaten raw":^[2][1] it is formed from a word meaning "green, raw, uncooked" and one meaning "eaten",^[2][8] and its final -ash is a plural ending, as in succotash.^[6][2][12] Merriam-Webster gives the source as Natick and Narragansett,^[3] and Partridge compares Massachusett askoot-asquash.^[18] An earlier English form was isquoutersquash,^[3][1] and the OED compares squanter-squash.^[6]

Earliest recorded meaning

A gourd of one of the trailing plants of the genus Cucurbita, eaten as a vegetable: 1643, in Roger Williams's A Key into the Language of America,^[6][1] an American English word.^[1] Merriam-Webster dates the first known use to 1634.^[3]

Semantic evolution

From 1661 the name was used for the plant as well as the fruit.^[6] Kinds were soon told apart with modifiers, from 1731 in Philip Miller's Gardeners Dictionary,^[6] and today American usage divides them into summer and winter squashes.^[3] The squash bug, which feeds on the leaves, is named from 1807.^[2] In 18th-century Gloucestershire a pumpkin was called a squash.^[15] In 19th-century American campus slang squash or squash-head was a fool.^[16]

Timeline

• 1634 – first known use, according to Merriam-Webster.^[3]
• 1643 – the gourd, in Roger Williams.^[6][1]
• 1661 – the plant.^[6]
• 1807 – squash bug.^[2]
• 1855 – squash-head, a fool, in American slang.^[16]

Meanings

Noun

1. The fleshy fruit of any of various plants of the genus Cucurbita, with a thick rind, cooked and eaten as a vegetable: We roasted the squash with garlic.^[7][3][12]
2. A bushy or trailing plant that bears such fruit.^[7][3][6]

Word family

• summer squash
• winter squash
• acorn squash
• squash bug