[Ads-l] Is "Jazzum" / "Jassum" the Etymon of "Jazz" ?

[Shapiro, Fred]

Is it possible that Barry Popik has discovered, in "jazzum," the etymon of "jazz''?  Barry has emailed a number of people presenting a cryptic 1900 citation for "jazzum."  I want to present some intriguing evidence that seemingly links "jazzum" to "jazz" not only in form but also semantically.  I obtain this evidence by searching for the variant "jassum" in Newspapers.com.  There are citations for "jassum" that have the connotation of "energy" and, explicitly, "pep" that are also present in many early citations for "jazz."

[1902  Town Talk (Alexandria, La.)  10 Dec. 2  Beneath a beautiful starlit night, with zephyrs floating through the transoms, laden with the orange and jassum.]

1915  Oakland Enquirer  4 Oct. 7  A "jassum relay" is the newest thing in cinder path affairs.

1915  University Oklahoman  8 Oct. 4  The words adapted from the favorite gridiron song of an eastern university, and the music, calculated to inspire unmitigated "jassum" in the most sophisticated freshman or the most staid senior, have been sung in eleven hundred different shades of vocalizing at every meeting of students since Assembly Wednesday morning, and at none were they better used as vehicles of "pep" than at meetings called for that purpose.

1915  University Oklahoman  15 Oct. 1  Everyone was jam full of jassum.

1915  University Oklahoman  29 Oct. 1  The advance of fashions and the broadening of the mind induced by the growth of Jassum.

1916  Wewoka (Okla.) Democrat  18 May 1  The High School students all came together, and the "Jassum Kings" reigned again in all their former glory.

1916  Norman (Okla.) Democrat-Topic 28 July 1  All of the members of the graduating class are putting forth every effort to make the evening's entertainment full of "pep," "jassum" and life.

Although I am suggesting that "jassum" is the immediate etymon of "jazz," John Baker has pointed out: "I assume that 'jazzum' is just a variant spelling of 'jasm,' already identified as the most likely source for 'jazz.'"  This may be persuasive as the ultimate etymon.  The significance of the "jassum" citations may be the explicit lining up in some of them with the word "pep," which was clearly a synonym of "jazz."  If the 1900 occurrence of "jazzum" is the same word as in the 1915 and 1916 citations of "jassum" and not a pure coincidence, then the prehistory of "jazz" begins by 1900.

I should provide Barry's 1900 citation here:

1900  Los Angeles Times 29 June 8  Mr. Andrews, ex-president of Brown University, once in Boston, said that to express the get-there spirit of certain Americans he had been forced to coin a new word.  That the word was suggested to him by the sound of a large circular saw when it meets a knot as it bites its way through the huge log.  The word is euphonic, and is, in fact, "Jazzum."  One can almost picture the operation and feel his nerves on edge as he speaks the word.  It is a good word; Roosevelt has the quality and is sure to take lots of jazzum into the Senate with him.  There is a magnetism about him which appeals to every energetic man.

Fred Shapiro
Editor
New Yale Book of Quotations (Yale University Press)







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