Pirate Booty vs. Body Booty

Hello, you have A Way with Words.

Hi, this is Deb Mecham from Omaha, Nebraska.

Hello, Deb. Welcome to the show.

Well, the other day, listening to my oldies station, I heard Casey and the Sunshine Band playing Shake Your Booty. And I realized that my four-year-old granddaughter uses the word booty when she refers to her derriere. And then I wondered about pirate booty. And I just wondered where that all came from, if there’s a connection between the two.

One of my thoughts about a pirate’s booty is I know there’s a lot of French history with some of the pirates, and I wondered if it was some sort of relationship to the French word, bote. But I have no idea, but it’s just kind of a funny word. And I wondered if the two were connected and how we got to use them so frequently.

Great question. Now I’m picturing all these pirates shaking their booty.

Shaking their booty.

Yeah, but those two words are not related. The booty that is what pirates covet is probably from an old Germanic word that means loot or plunder. And that goes back to the 15th century. And it may be influenced by the old English word boat, B-O-T, which means advantage or a little more. And that gave us to boot as in, you know, in addition, something to boot.

Oh, sure. Okay. So the pirate’s booty is not related to your derriere. The booty that you shake, and I’m sure you did when that song came on, that booty is actually an alteration of body, B-O-T-T-Y, which is your bottom. And back in the 1920s, in the language of Black Americans, body was a term for the derriere. And over time, body became booty and bootylicious.

My daughter, my granddaughter says, I’m going to scooch my booty over.

Yeah, there you go.

Scooch your booty.

Scooch your boot.

Yes, yes.

All righty, Ben. Well, thank you very much. I appreciate it.

Well, thanks so much for calling, Deb.

All right, take care, Deb.

Sure.

Bye-bye.