"Hootchie-cootchie" etymology (partly speculative)

[Douglas G. Wilson]

I looked around for the etymology of "cootie". I didn't find it. But I
found something else.

Note that the earliest instance of "hootchie-cootchie" [dance] in HDAS has
the following, dated 1895: <<She never saw the kutchy-kutchy>>. Forms like
"coochy-coochy" and "couchee-couchee" coexisted with forms like
"hoochy-coochy" for some time. If "coochy-coochy" or so was ancestral,
maybe the change of the initial /k/ to /h/ was influenced by an older
"Hoochy Coochy" (not a dance) cited in HDAS from 1890.

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_Los Angeles Times_, 26 May 1901: p. 11:

<<San Berdoo wants its street fair made permanent -- coochy-coochy, "Little
Egypt" and all, we suppose.>>

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The spelling "kutchy-kutchy" brings to mind the "coochy-coochy-coo" which
is spoken to a baby, and which appeared in an 1884 song title (sheet music
reproduced at the LOC "American Memory" site) "Kutchy! Kutchy! Little
Baby!" (a song about a baby, not about a cooch dancer).

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_Atlanta Constitution_, 4 Nov. 1885: p. 4:

<<The latest popular song is "Kutchy, Kutchy, Little Baby," by Victor Hawley.>>

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I presume "kutchy" here is pronounced /kUtSi/ or /kutSi/. Here is the same
spelling used much later.

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_Indiana Evening Gazette_ (Indiana PA), 25 Jan. 1962: p. 6:

<<George Meany ... gave out with a chin-chucking "Kutchy-Kutchy-Coo" for
young Jack [John F. Kennedy, Jr. --DW].>>

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The exact form "coochy coochy" for the dance (however spelled) might be
modeled on this expression. However, a little earlier than "hoochy coochy"
or "coochy coochy" there was the apparently virtually synonymous "kuta kuta
[dance]" (with variants).

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_Chicago Daily [Tribune]_, 22 May 1892: p. 30:

<<A humorous feature of the production of "Elysium" was the
widely-advertised dance of a woman whose name I have forgotten, but who, it
was gravely asserted, had been famous in India for several years. .... She
performed what was known as the "Koota-Koota" dance. This is a series of
postures of such a nature that even in Calcutta the dance was considered
infamous.>>

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_New York Times_, 7 May 1893: p. 13:

<<Mlle. Vita will also present the "Koota-Koota dance," which is new and
alarming.>>

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_Chicago Daily Tribune_, 13 Aug. 1893: p. 28:

<<The Florence Miller Burlesque company will appear at the Isabella Theater
.... The program states that the Princess Kuta Kuta of Constantinople will
appear in dances.>>

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_Chicago Daily Tribune_, 20 Aug. 1893: p. 29:

[advertisement]

<<Also the Greatest of all Oriental Sensations, / PRINCESS KUTA KUTA /
"DANS DE VAUNTRE." [sic; presumably "dans du ventre" or so = "belly dance"
--DW]>>

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_Washington Post_, 5 Dec. 1894: p. 6:

<<The kutcha-kutcha dance, which was put on with the Reily & Wood show at
Kernan's Theater, Monday night, was stopped yesterday by Mr. Kernan, who
was much displeased with it. Yesterday morning Lieut. Amiss went to the
theater and said that the dance would have to stop, and was told that the
dancer had already been ordered to modify and tone down her performance.>>

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_Chicago Daily Tribune_, 13 Jan. 1895: p. 36:

[advertisement]

<<Belles of Bagdad / In the Terpsichorean Gem of the Orient, the / KUTA
KUTA DANCE.>>

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_Davenport Daily Republican_ (Davenport IA), 24 Oct. 1895: p. 1:

<<Chicago, Oct. 23 -- Members of the national association of implement
manufacturers went on record today as being opposed to Midway exhibitions
at county fairs. A resolution was adopted which cited that windmills,
threshing machines and vehicles stood no earthly chance whatever by the
side of the seductive Kuta Kuta dance, and a vigorous campaign will at once
be begun to wipe out this sort of naughtiness, so the farmer will take some
time for the inspection of agricultural displays.>>

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But whence "kuta kuta"? Does it have a meaning in Bengali or Turkish or
Arabic? Was it made up at random? Maybe it was modeled on "hula-hula"
(i.e., "hula"), a dance which was seen at the time as somewhat similar.

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_Davenport Tribune_ (Davenport IA), 14 Feb. 1894: p. 3(?):

<<The dance du ventre has reached San Francisco, and the San Franciscans
who know Hawaii say it greatly resembles the Hawaiian native hula-hula
dance. Several Turkish girls from the Midway were taken to San Francisco to
present their peculiar gyrations and gymnastics, but their manager very
soon found that what goes in Chicago may not go in San Francisco, any more
than in New York. The dance was promptly suppressed.>>

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_Coshocton Daily Age_ (Coshocton OH), 16 Nov. 1900: p. 1:

<<Just think of it; grave old brokers dancing the Hula-hula and
couchee-couchee ....>>

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I know Gerald Cohen has written something about "hootchie-cootchie" but it
is not available to me.

-- Doug Wilson