June 26, 1998

merkin

"Merkin" is a word that I've been hearing in conversation for a few years now. It was originally described to me as being a pubic wig, and I sometimes hear it used to mean pubic hair itself. It's not, however, in any dictionaries (and *trust me*, I've looked) nor have I seen it in print. Can you provide any insights on this ever-so-useful word?

It's not in any dictionaries? I do trust you, but perhaps there are a few you haven't checked. It's certainly in the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, and the Oxford English Dictionary, and just last year I put it into the Random House Historical Dictionary of American Slang.

The word merkin does, as you say, mean 'false hair for the female genitalia; a pubic wig'. It also has some transferred meanings, such as 'the female genitalia', and while I haven't personally encountered the sense 'the pubic hair', it's a natural development and I'm sure it's real.

As with so many other fascinating words, the main point about merkin is simply that such a remarkable word exists. However, it has indeed been used in print, and by quite skilled authors: "I was looking merely for a soothing presence, a glorified pot-au-feu, an animated merkin" (Nabokov, Lolita); "He wears a false cunt and merkin of sable both handcrafted...by the notorious Mme. Ophir" (Pynchon, Gravity's Rainbow). The word pops up indirectly in the name Merkin Muffley, the President of the U.S. in Dr. Strangelove, and it does get occasional use in the magazines: "Its cover was an illustration, by Cassandre, depicting a pattern of feathers and what appeared to be floating merkins" (The New Yorker, 1992).

Merkin does have some currency, especially on the Internet, as a term for 'an American' or 'American English'; this is punning on a pronunciation of American.

Merkin is first attested in the early seventeenth century. It is probably a variant of the earlier malkin, which could mean 'a mop', and was also used as a disparaging term for women.