[Lexicog] plough mud

[David Frank]

John --

Yes, I imagine that "plough mud" is an Americanism, but in fact I believe the vast majority of Americans wouldn't know that term. As far as I can tell, its use is restricted to the Charleston area of South Carolina, which is on the southeastern U.S. coastline. For you non-Americans, Charleston is alongside Baltimore and Boston as one of the oldest cities and ports in what is now the United States.

My interest in Charleston is that it is the port where most slaves were brought to these shores, and it is in the area where the Gullah language and culture got established. The person who asked me about "plough mud" has a book in press about Gullah, though I am not sure that word has anything to do with Gullah. When she asked me this question, we happened to be visiting the grave of Porgy, of Porgy and Bess fame.

I don't think "plough mud" is a vulgar expression in terms of being crude, but it is vulgar in terms of being common language. Do a Google search on it. I found that the spelling "plough mud" got more hits than "pluff mud," though neither one of them got a lot of hits. I didn't get anything for "plow mud."

As to the question of why the spelling would be "plough mud" rather than "plow mud," I have two guesses. The first is that the spelling of "plough" might have been in use some, even on these shores. My KJV Bible that I have here uses the spelling "plow," but I am guessing that some KJV Bibles that were in use in the Charleston area in the past might have used the spelling "plough." That is just a guess, and I have to be careful about such guesses.

My second guess is probably more likely, namely that "plough mud" doesn't really have anything to do with plowing. The person who asked me about the term did think it was associated with plowing, but the Google search I did didn't show up anything about using this mud in plowing or for fertilzer. That could be a folk etymology.

If plough mud doesn't have an etymological connection with plowing, then there is another possibility pointed out to me this morning by my colleague Dick Watson. There is an old Scottish word "pluff" what means about the same thing as "puff." It could be spelled "plough" on analogy with "rough."

So I have already told you more than I know, and I will wait to see if any more insights are coming.

-- David Frank

 

From: lexicographylist at yahoogroups.com [mailto:lexicographylist at yahoogroups.com] On Behalf Of John Roberts
Sent: Tuesday, May 25, 2010 3:29 AM
To: lexicographylist at yahoogroups.com
Subject: Re: [Lexicog] plough mud

 

David,

I don't have any answers to your queries, but I had a comment and a query.

Comment: "plough mud" appears to be an Americanism, since I don't find it in any of my English dictionaries, including my dictionaries on slang expressions.

Query: If "plough mud" is an American expression why is it not spelled "plow mud"?

And finally, for a nonAmerican who has never heard this expression before is it actually a "vulgar" expression?

John Roberts




  _____  

David Frank wrote: 

I was in Charleston, SC, last week, a friend of mine who is a researcher and an author but not a linguist asked me to help make some sense out of the term "plough mud," pronounced and sometimes spelled "pluff mud." You can do a Google search if you want to see more about how the term is used. This term seems to be local to Charleston.

Plough mud is dark brown silty mud that reportedly can be used as fertilizer. I was asked whether perhaps "plough" (plow) was pronounced a couple hundred years ago with an /f/ sound at the end, rhyming with English "rough." I said that I didn't know, but I would try to find out.

What we do know is that "plough mud" and "pluff mud" refer to the same thing, and that the latter spelling is more representative of its pronunciation.

What we don't know is if this term really had anything to do with plowing. That could be a folk etymology.

Another thing I don't know is whether "plough" was ever pronounced, in the past, perhaps dialectally, like "pluff." It is a reasonable guess, based on analogy with "rough," but a reasonable guess isn't good enough. In fact, the little bit of etymological research I have done has not shown that to be a pronunciation.

Does anyone reading this know the answer? Or else, does anybody know how to find out the answer?

-- David

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