My Theory on etymology of GAG by Muffler-Service, literature
Literature
My Theory on etymology of GAG
"Gag" is one of my favorite words obviously. It just sounds right, somehow. It's kind of odd, weird, and has this silly quality. What most people don't know- the etymology or word origin for "gag" is kind of a mystery. It appears in the 1600s randomly in literature, meaning exactly what we think of now- "A cloth tied over the mouth to silence a captive". This actually pre-dates the meaning of "joke" or "wretch". The leading theory is that it comes from the old germanic "Gaghals" which means "throwing back your head" but even etymologists admit that it still does not make sense why it suddenly became "A device to silence a person". Before this time, the word for gag would have been "Brank" (More on that later) and they were metal gags only placed on women actually. My theory is that the actual origin comes from a phrase that appeared at the same time, early 1600s, which was "Goo-goo-Ga-Ga" or simply "Ga-Ga". This phrase that we know associate with baby talk. Obviously the origin is