[Ads-l] Antedating of G-string

[James A. Landau]

On Friday, April 1, 2016 10:42 AM John Baker wrote:

>The OED and Merriam-Webster have G-string, a breech-cloth, from 1878, 
>although I think it's been taken back at least to 1877 on ADS-L.  Here's 
>an example from 1875.  Notably, it uses the spelling "G-string," although 
>the earliest examples previously found have "geestring" or "gee-string."  
>This is from the (Washington, D.C.) National Republican, May 21, 1875 
>(Newspapers.com).
>
>"Quite a number of the Sioux Indians visited the navy yard yesterday, 
>and spent an hour among the big guns.  They appear more peaceable and 
>child-like now.  If they could only be made to carry a battery or two of those 
>fifteen-inch Long Toms in their G-string pouches, as silent reminders of 
>our prowess, it might have a salutary effect on them." 

In the War of 1812 the US Navy had three types of cannons: carronade (short barrel), columbiad (intermediate-length barrel) and "Long Tom" (long, cylindrical barrel).  All three types were specified by the weight of the spherical cannonball they could fire: "eighteen-pounder", "twenty-four pounder", etc.

By the Civil War the US Navy had a much wider variety of cannons.  Some were referred to by the weight of the cannonball, as before, and some by the diameter of the barrel, e.g. "fifteen-inch".  Now the Navy used only one variety of fifteen-inch gun, and that was called the "Dahlgren" (after its designer) or the "soda-water bottle" after its shape, which was NOT cylindrical.  As far as I know, the 15-inch and its little brother the 11-inch Dahlgren were never called "long Toms".

Far from clarifying the issue, this only makes it more complicated.  Why were people at the Navy Yard mixing up naval terminology?  (And why did the Sioux appear "peaceable" only one year before Custer's Last Stand?)

The only explanation that makes sense to me is that someone was choosing to say that the Sioux had 15-inch penes, and used the term "Long Tom" because that was the only phallic-looking cannon.

If "G-string" were the original form, than an obvious guess would be that the breechcloth is compared to the G string of a violin, that being the thickest (and therefore lowest in pitch, generally G below Middle C) string on a violin.  However the spellings "geestring" or "gee-string" make that guess seem less obvious.  The only other guess I have is that "gee" comes from the practice of teamsters yelling "gee" or "haw" to the teams to steer them.  "Gee" is the command to turn away from the driver (in the US and Canada, to the right).

- Jim Landau

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