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The word "piggyback," as in, "Honey, it's my turn to get a piggyback tonight," derives from the terms "pickpack," "pickback," and even "pick-a-pack," all used in the 17th century to indicate the act of hoisting something onto someone's back for carrying. According to the Random House Word of the Day, most etymologists assume "pick" is a variant of the verb "to pitch," meaning "to throw." "Pack" refers to items meant for carrying. But how did the piggy grunt its way into the mix? Did giant domesticated hogs,
back in the day, do the work of packhorses? No, what we have here, apparently, is a failure to communicate: a textbook case of folk etymology, in which a word is modified to something more common or easily understood when the original term has become obsolete, and thus devoid of meaning. Some examples of folk etymology at work, according to Wikipedia, are the evolving of the words "shamefast" into "shamefaced," "buttonhole into "buttonhold," and "sweetard" into "sweatheart." (But there's no truth to the rumor that Ask Yahoo! used to be called "Axe Yahoos," back in the dot-com downturn days.)
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