imaginative etymologies: BUCK NAKED

[RonButters at AOL.COM]

In a message dated 4/6/04 9:34:14 AM, jsmithjamessmith at YAHOO.COM writes:


> Seems to me that "buck naked" could be from the
> seemingly, to the eyes of Eurocentric settlers,
> unclothed state of male Indians.  (And in 1928 there
> were still lots of "old timers" around to pass this
> use on.)
> 

What is the relationship between Indians and the word "buck"? 

While we are speculating, we might also include the phrase "regency buck" 
that was used historically to describe young men at a certain period of English 
history and who, being young men, presumably liked to take off their clothes 
whenever it was prudent to do so.

And of course a "buck" is a dollar bill. "Dollar-bill naked" is doubtless a 
phrase that could have originated in the practice of shoving bills into the 
g-strings of go-go boys. 

And of course "buck" has a good deal of similarity to the f-word, which 
describes an activity in which people tend to like to get naked.

Or maybe people sometimes just buck their clothes off.

Sometimes, especially in the winter it just plain sucks to be naked. Think of 
all those underclothed Indians in Massachusetts at Thanksgiving!