June 16, 1997

gewgaw

On the front page of a recent New York Times, an article posited that Thanksgiving is the one remaining American holiday not besotted with "geegaws." In other words, one is not obligated to buy a loved one trinkets or put up decorative tchotchkes in celebration of Thanksgiving. Coincidentally, a Wall Street Journal article the same day about home security notes that the home-security industry preys on homeowners' fears by selling them "security bells, whistles and gewgaws." I've seen this word occasionally and still can barely pronounce it, much less use it comfortably in a sentence. My dictionary lists both spellings of the word, but the Times's "geegaws" is listed only as an alternate spelling of the Journal's "gewgaws." A definition is given for gewgaws, but no known origin. I was wondering which spelling is more correct, and whether you have any better sources on the origins of geegaws/gewgaws.

My, this does seem to be the stretch for words-of-unknown-origin questions.

First of all, gewgaw is usually pronounced "gyoo-gaw," rhyming with "raw," although "goo-gaw" is almost as common, and is how I pronounce it. Allegedly the word is sometimes pronounced "gee-gaw," a pronunciation probably associated with the geegaw spelling, but I've never heard this myself. The usual meaning is 'something gaudy and useless; a trinket; bauble'.

Gewgaw is of unknown origin. It is first found in English in its current form in the early sixteenth century. The earliest appearance in any form was in the early thirteenth century, when it was written giuegoue, leading some scholars to argue that this represents "give-gove" (us and vs were represented by the same letter in writing) and positing a Dutch origin on complicated grounds. Another school suggests a relation to gogue an Old French word meaning 'a joke; jest' that appears to be the origin of the modern à go-go.

All one can say with certainty, however, is that gewgaw is a gradational compound. Gradational compounds, which we discussed recently, are reduplications where the vowel is changed, such as mishmash or hee-haw, and in English can often indicate derision or contempt.

The spelling of the word has been, as you might expect, highly variable over the years. Some recorded variants include guegaw, guy-gaw, gugaw, gwegawe [sic], gewgaie, gugae, and gewgow, so we shouldn't be too surprised that there are two versions common enough now to make it into dictionaries. I think that gewgaw is significantly more common, but geegaw is certainly out there. We've collected several examples from the New York Times, so it could be a house style or the preference of an editor there. Nonetheless, should you have occasion to use the word yourself, I'd recommend gewgaw.