flutterbys

[Laurence Horn]

At 4:00 PM -0400 10/19/06, George Thompson wrote:
>A radio commercial for the NY State Lotteries is taking the theme
>of "amazing facts" (or some such).  At one part, the voice reads four
>or five names and states that they are the names of species of
>butterflies.  It next states that it is an amazing fact that
>butterflies were originally called flutterbys.
>
>This is a notion that isn't supported by the OED.  Nonetheless, it
>isn't original to the State Lottery bookies, either.  I've come upon
>it before.  And no doubt it's a prettier thought than the etymology
>endorsed half-heartedly by the OED, that "the insect was so called
>from the appearance of its excrement".
>
>GAT
>
>George A. Thompson
>Author of A Documentary History of "The African Theatre", Northwestern
>Univ. Pr., 1998, but nothing much lately.
>
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>The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org

Just happened to be looking at a book called _Who Put the Butter in
Butterfly_ (Harper & Row, 1989), by a "popular culture" MA from
Bowling Green named David Feldman (also author of _How to Win at Just
About Everything_ and _Why Do Clocks Run Clockwise?_).  He mentions
the excrement, the fact that the most common butterfly in
England--the brimstone--is butter-colored, Dr. Johnson's theory that
butterflies appeared in butter-churning season (spring), and the
Morrises' theory that acc. to medieval folklore, "witches and fairies
would fly and steal butter at night--in the form of butterflies".
Nothing about the flutterbys, which I had also heard (and dismissed)
a few times...

LH

------------------------------------------------------------
The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org