Taboo replacements

[Anthony Appleyard]

In discussion re `ass' = "donkey" and also being the USA word for UK
"arse",
Rick Mc Callister <rmccalli at sunmuw1.MUW.Edu> wrote:-

> So why didn't this word's homonym come into American English as "arse"
> with an /R/?  Was <ass> "buttocks" borrowed from later British English or
> from New England or Southern English?

> [ Moderator's comment:
> When I lived in Connecticut, I met people who made a distinction between
> "arse" and "ass" consistently, not as a learned item but in casual speech.
>  --rma ]

I heard once of a German word `assloch' = "anus". Perhaps there is
influence here from German immigrants: compare the USA English word
"burg" = "town" taken from German, and a USA habit of mispronouncing UK
placenames ending in "-burgh" as if they were spelt "-burg".

And in the case of the English word "hart" becoming disused, as in
previous discussion, there is also an ambiguity-causing homophony with
"heart" here to affect matters.