While watching a broadcast about the Artemis moon launch, Josh from Jacksonville, Florida, noted that amid all the precise language, scientists describing precise orbital adjustments used the word tad, as in just a tad, which seemed like the opposite of precise. The word tad was American slang for a small child in the mid-19th century, and Abraham Lincoln’s son Thomas, was called Tad. That nickname might be a shortening of tadpole, although this story is disputed. Related small words like tit and tat (as in tit for tat) form a cluster of terms for tiny things, including taddick, toddick, and taddle. What is certain is that tad meaning “a small amount” is an Americanism that dates to the mid-1800s. This is part of a complete episode.
Transcript of “Just a Tad, a Small Kid to a Small Thing”
Hello, you have A Way with Words.
Hi, this is Josh from calling from Jacksonville.
Hi Josh from Jacksonville.
What’s on your mind?
Well, I was watching the Artemis launch recently, and it was as epic as it was, I was thrown off a little bit because as they’re talking about the details and everything, they said, you know, something about the posi positioning had to change just a tad.
And it got me thinking about how, you know, specific they were being, but then going to just a tad threw me off and I’m like, where did we even get that from?
Like just just a tad, just a little bit.
So you said that they were being specific, but do you feel like TAD is kind of a a a measurement for scientists?
Like the rocket scientists would be using a tad?
Why don’t they say like a centimeter?
Right.
Yeah.
Or something way more ac actually specific.
No, this was it that’s why it threw me off so much.
Gotcha being that, you know, everything has to be perfect with a launch like that, especially going around the the moon.
And yeah, it just made me think like where did we get that measurement a t a tad and like like it could mean so many different things, but obviously that’s just a little bit.
Yeah, I agree.
It’s a little bit weird to see it in in a scientific context.
The word tad meaning a small amount, it’s a little bit of a mystery how that meaning came about, but it probably began as American slang for a small child in the in the mid-19th century.
And actually, Abraham Lincoln’s son, who was named Thomas, acquired the nickname Tad very early.
Some people will say that Tad is just a shortened form of Tadpole.
And and that Abraham Lincoln’s son wiggled had a big head and a little body and wiggled around a lot and that’s why they called him Tad.
I suspect it had to do that the sense of Tad meaning small amount just kind of a rose because it’s a small, you know, it that it’s in that class of words that are that are just tiny words.
Yeah and and the other part there’s two other things I want to toss in here, Martha.
One is it looks like most of the sources and references that say it comes from Tadpole all got that information from the Oxford English Dictionary.
But the Oxford English Dictionary entry hasn’t been updated in a really long time, and I suspect when they update it that purported etymology will will either disappear or be reduced in importance because we have expressions like tit for tat, which is a kind of a quid pro quo when you do you you you push back or a return an action to somebody, usually a a a mean one.
And and there’s no reason that the tit and tat in that expression couldn’t also have come to the fora as you know broken down into component parts.
And it may have come from tip for tap, T-A-P.
And all these small words are confusing, and their likelihood of appearing from many sources at any time makes it really impossible to know if they’re for sure related or they were devised independently or what exactly happened.
And you know, we have this other whole thing too.
There’s this cluster of words from the American South that mean small, including tad and tat, but also taddock and todd and tadl.
And those could be kind of pet forms or or hypochristic forms of longer words made short in order to represent s small things or small people.
So it’s just it’s just too confusing here, but but Martha’s gists I can back completely, which is it’s an American term, came around in the mid-1800s sounds appropriate being such an American term then for the Artemis launch.
Yeah, exactly.
I I love the idea that there’s a bunch of rocket scientists going like, yeah, just nudge it a little bit.
You don’t have to measure.
Eyeball it.
See the by the seat of your pants, guys.
It’ll get there.
And check it twelve times.
Yeah, exactly.
So that’s pretty much what we know about Ted.
Thank you so much.
Yeah.
I’ve been using it without questioning it for so long and then hearing it in that context just made it it just stuck out like a sore th thumb.
So yeah thank you.
Well we appreciate the time, Josh.
Take care of yourself.
Thank you.
Bye bye.
Thanks Josh.
Bye bye.
Well maybe you came across a word that you’ve said all your life and then you saw it in a different context and you thought, what?
Where did that word come from?
What does it really mean?
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