Huckmuck, anyone?
Patok
'huckmuck', and the word history? So far I am aware of two meanings, are
there any others? The ones I know are:
- a bird name in England (apparently used to describe the Willow Warbler
and/or the Long Tailed Tit ;)
- a strainer used in brewing
Thanks.
Peter Duncanson
wrote:
The OED has only the strainer meaning.
There is no etymology given:
huckmuck
local.
Also 5 huk-, 6 -mock.
'A strainer used in brewing. It consists of a bundle of
twigs, generally part of an old broom, placed at the bottom
of the mashing-keeve or vat, to prevent the grains running
out when the wort is drawn off' (Elworthy W. Som. Word-bk.
1886).
1472 Yatton Churchw. Acc. (Som. Rec. Soc.), For iiij
hukmuckes vjd, for hopyng iiid.
1517 Ibid. 135 Payd for huckmocks vjd.
1825 BRITTON Wiltsh. Gloss. (E.D.S.), Huckmuck, a kind of
strainer used in brewing.
Where iiij, vjd and iiid represent numbers and sums of money.
i = 1 (one)
j = 1 used in place of i in some positions
v = 5
d = denarius (penny)
So:
iiij = 4,
vjd = 6d = sixpence,
iiid = 3d = threepence.
--
Peter Duncanson, UK
(in alt.english.usage)
Peter Duncanson
wrote:
> Would please someone here with OED access check all the meanings of
You might already know that there is a CD-ROM book that promises
to answer the questions:
What birds go by these names;
Agu, Bessy Blakeling, Bonxie, Bowger, Charlie-muftie,
Chepster, Dip Ears, Eligug, Foolscoat, Guga, Harpy,
Huckmuck, Iran, Jonquil, Kitchin Hawk, Lady Bird, Moko,
Nettlemonger, Nine Killer, Oar-cock, Peggy Dishwasher,
Piddle, Pinchem, Pox, Puck, Quink, Rat-goose, Scuttock,
Thief, U-tick, Vanner, Wall-plat, Wellplum, Yaldrin, Zoozoo,
etc?
And more importantly, why?
The answers to these questions and
many others can be found in my CD-ROM book.
available at the price of "GBP24.95 P&P Free to UK Customers
only"
http://www.birdnames.co.uk/
Patok
> On Thu, 29 Nov 2007 13:51:54 -0500, Patok <pa...@pataklama.net>
> wrote:
>
>> Would please someone here with OED access check all the meanings of
>> 'huckmuck', and the word history? So far I am aware of two meanings, are
>> there any others? The ones I know are:
>>
>> - a bird name in England (apparently used to describe the Willow Warbler
>> and/or the Long Tailed Tit ;)
>> - a strainer used in brewing
>>
> The OED has only the strainer meaning.
> There is no etymology given:
>
> huckmuck
> local.
This is getting weirder by the minute. If OED doesn't have the bird
meaning, was there any dictionary that had the meaning(s) tit, titmouse,
tomtit, at the end of the 19th or the beginning of the 20th century? The
Century Dictionary (available online) has a bird meaning, but it is the
Willow Warbler. Here is the story:
I saw 'huckmuck' meaning titmouse/tomtit (the Bulgarian word is
'siniger') in an old English-Bulgarian dictionary left from my
grandfather, presumably this book: http://tinyurl.com/2hbm2f . I say
presumably, because it is back in Bulgaria and I can't check it now, but
the publishing date of 1908 is about right.
Where could the author have gotten that meaning from? Even the
Century dictionary lists it (actually 'huck-muck') as Prov.Eng., I guess
equivalent to OED's 'local'. The preface to my copy of the
English-Bulgarian dictionary was written, IIRC, in 'Tsarigrad', on
'Gergjov-den' (in Istanbul, on Saint George's day), so nowhere near
England, provincial or otherwise.
Initially, when I didn't find 'huckmuck' meaning 'tit' in any
contemporary dictionary (the small editions of OED in some libraries I
checked didn't have it either), I started wondering if it wasn't a
fictitious word to catch eventual plagiarists, since in Bulgarian
'huck-muck' or 'hucka(ta)-mucka(ta)' is an imitative word for the
ashamed or confused explanations a perpetrator would give when caught
red-handed. Recently, however, with the advent of Google Books, several
books surfaced that show the 'titmouse' meaning, which kind of disproves
my conjecture.
Note: I'm crossposting this to soc.culture.bulgaria, in case
somebody there knows more about this 'mystery'.
John Dean
> On Thu, 29 Nov 2007 13:51:54 -0500, Patok <pa...@pataklama.net>
> wrote:
>
>> Would please someone here with OED access check all the meanings
>> of 'huckmuck', and the word history? So far I am aware of two
>> meanings, are there any others? The ones I know are:
>>
>> - a bird name in England (apparently used to describe the Willow
>> Warbler and/or the Long Tailed Tit ;)
>> - a strainer used in brewing
>>
> The OED has only the strainer meaning.
Not entirely the story. There's no other head-word entry but under
'poke-pudding' there is:
" 3. A local name of the Long-tailed Titmouse.
1856 Eng. Cycl. Nat. Hist. IV. 203 This is the Poke Pudding, Huckmuck,
and Mum-Ruffin of the English. 1885 Swainson Prov. Names Birds 32 (British
Long-tailed Titmouse) Poke pudding or Poke bag (Gloucestershire; Salop).
Pudding bag (Norfolk)."
But you could do some research on-line to see what you might pick up. Among
which would be:
http://www.probertencyclopaedia.com/cgi-bin/xphrase.pl?keyword=slovenly
"Huckmuck is Dorset slang for dirty, slovenly."
http://teaching.shu.ac.uk/ds/sle/altered/glossary/drinkglossary.htm
"Huckmuck 'Sieve fixed to the bottom of the capstaff; also called tapwad or
strum' (Sambrook)."
and
http://www.british-history.ac.uk/report.aspx?compid=58915
"Wort strainer
A STRAINER for straining the HOPS from the WORT after it has been boiled up,
and before the fermentation process is begun by which BEER is made. The only
wort strainer noted in the Dictionary Archive was in a brewhouse
[Inventories (1729)]. Pamela Sambrook shows that there were other utensils
used for similar purposes but with different names as 'Hopback', Huckmuck',
'Strom', 'Tapwad' and 'Temse' [Sambrook (1996)]."
So 'Sambrook' might be a name to pursue and 'hopback' might be an
interesting line of enquiry.
--
John Dean
Oxford
Offramp
> On Thu, 29 Nov 2007 13:51:54 -0500, Patok <pa...@pataklama.net>
> wrote:
> You might already know that there is a CD-ROM book that promises
> to answer the questions:
>
> What birds go by these names;
> ..., Zoozoo,
> etc?
The zoozoo, which I found out only this year is a wood pigeon, is
named after its call, apparently. But the wood pigeons in my neck of
the woods don't make that sound.