Tuesday, July 5, 2011

Turd

Turd \TURD\ , noun;
1. A piece of excrement
2. A mean, contemptible person

Today is my birthday, so just to keep things interesting I'm going to post about my least favorite English word: turd. It's just such a horrible sounding word, and then you add the actual definition and it gets worse. Turd. Ew.

The origin of turd is Old English tord from Proto-Germanic *turdam, which derives from Proto-Indo-European *drtom. *Drtom is the past participle of the base *d(e)r-, which means "flay, tear," so "that which is separated (or torn off) from the body" or "excrement" makes sense. Similarly, shit derives from a Proto-Indo-European word, *skheid, meaning "split, divide".

Turd meaning something worthless and vile is attested from the mid-13th century, while the meaning "despicable person" is first recorded in the mid-15th century.

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