Talk:pussy

(informal; also pussy-cat) An affectionate term for a cat.

isnt pussy or pussycat specifically a female cat? lygophile


 * No, all housecats are pussycats. —Stephen 14:18, 23 January 2007 (UTC)

pussy
Bizarre nautical def. --Connel MacKenzie 16:26, 14 October 2007 (UTC)


 * It seems reasonable to me. Also, I found it used in this sense at http://www.corpun.com/kiss1.htm. —Stephen 12:31, 15 October 2007 (UTC)

Wouldn't this sense be the source of the term pussywhipped? -- Thisis0 18:18, 15 October 2007 (UTC)


 * Um, no, I don't think so. The "vagina" meaning of "pussy" is the component of the compound term.  The obsolete meaning was still obsolete in the early 1990s (or very late 1980s) when "pussy whipped" came into use.  The nautical definition (if it existed) was obsolete almost a century before that.  The "corpun" link above [warning: pop-unders, other disreputable crap from that site - use google cache if you can find it],  mentions "pussy" with almost identical wording as the original disputed entry here, but its "sample logs" show no such use (and are of questionable transcription anyway.)  This sounds like a fanciful back-formation.  --Connel MacKenzie 20:45, 15 October 2007 (UTC)


 * I should reword: Is it plausible that this sense influenced the term pussywhipped? (Which is attested from 1956, not "very late 1980s". What's your source for that tidbit? ) Slang terms frequently enter from nautical and wartime use.  Granted, it's only my imagination, but I see an excellent double-entendre when Navy boys would have started tossing around the term "pussywhipped", knowing the older nautical reference.  Again, only my imagination, but I thought it was interesting enough to look into.  I agree that this nautical sense lacks references anywhere on the net save Wikipedia -- at both Cat_o'_nine_tails and Glossary_of_nautical_terms (term: Reduced Cat).  They are unsourced, but it would be enlightening to find whatever source was used there. -- Thisis0 21:34, 15 October 2007 (UTC)

I am the editor of corpun.com. I have removed from the above a claim that my site has pop-unders, which it does not, and never has had; and a claim that the transcriptions of official records on my site are questionable. The extracts in question were carefully transcribed by myself at the Public Records Office. You can go there and check them yourself -- that is why I always cite the file numbers. C.Farrell.


 * I've moved your comment out of the archive. Conrad.Irwin 18:18, 13 June 2008 (UTC)

Is it possible that the "coward" meaning of pussy comes from pusillanimous? 21:44, 8 July 2009
 * Lots of things are possible – but where's the evidence? This claim is widespread on the web, but never substantiated; it just sounds like a convenient made-up excuse for sexism. See for a refutation. --Florian Blaschke (talk) 00:01, 15 October 2017 (UTC)

Etymology
The number of languages using "p/h-" words for the vulgar sense seems disproportionately high. There is a PIE root for it: *pisd-eh₂- ("vulva") which produced R. пизда (and other Slavic reflexes), Alb. pidhi and possibly Lith. putė (?). Finnish has pillu, Hungarian punci, pina. Chinese has 屄 (bī < *pit) which is common Sino-Tibetan: Yi pi⁵⁵, Qiang (Yadu) pʰoʂ, Loloish *batᴸ. Georgian ფისო (p’iso) < Proto-North-Caucasian *pūṭi ~ būṭi (?). Tagalog puday, puke < Proto-Austronesian *palaq, bediq, betiq₂. Korean 보지 (poci). Hbrug 11:26, 2 November 2011 (UTC)
 * This could be due a widespread type of nursery word that's something like /puci/ or /pici/. There are also variants in other labials like m- and w- ~ v-. Aren't there also words like /kuci/, /kut-/, /kun-/? (Stops can always be voiced.) I don't have an overview, but if there is a pattern there, baby talk is a more likely explanation. --Florian Blaschke (talk) 23:55, 14 October 2017 (UTC)

Is the "coward" sense derived from pusillanimous? If so, can we put that under another etymology header? See also https://english.stackexchange.com/questions/100990/how-does-pussy-come-to-mean-coward KevinUp (talk) 02:52, 21 September 2018 (UTC)
 * No, and if you actually read the link you posted, you'd see that the OED considers the semantic evolution to have been cat > endearing name for a girl > effeminate man, so it belongs under the same etymology (although a prose explanation should be inserted). —Μετάknowledge discuss/deeds 03:04, 21 September 2018 (UTC)
 * The previous definition "A coward; a weakling" has been modified to "A weak, cowardly, or effeminate man". Additional quotes have also been added, one of which mentions "pusillanimous". KevinUp (talk) 09:31, 22 September 2018 (UTC)