widows weeds - 11/08/03 01:43 AM
David (aka Trotwood) Copperfield goes to take tea chez Uriah Heep and his mother. She is wearing "widows weeds". It occurred to me that I didn't know where the word "weeds" came from. It was a tedious search, but I finally found it in www.word-detective com :
"One might assume that "widow's weeds" must be connected in some convoluted fashion to the "ugly plant" sort of weed one finds in one's garden. (Not that you'll find weeds in my garden, of course. Not since I had it paved.) But, to return to the question, one would be wrong. "Weeds" the plants and "weeds" the mournful getup worn by widows in days of yore are two entirely separate words with unrelated origins. The "ugly, worthless plant" kind of "weed" comes from the Old English word "weod," which meant "grass, herb or weed."
"Weeds" meaning "mourning clothes," on the other hand, comes from a very old Germanic root meaning "clothing," and when this "weed" first appeared in English around A.D. 888, it was used in the singular to mean simply "an article of clothing." By about 1297, "weed" or "weeds" meant a style of clothing typical of an occupation or station in life. One might speak of a priest's "weed" or a beggar's "weeds," for instance. The phrase "widow's weeds," denoting the black veils and other accoutrements of deep mourning, first appeared around 1595, and is the only use of "weeds" in this sense still commonly heard in English."
Now that I think of it, I think I have heard "weeds" used jocularly, to describe someone's dress clothes, but can't remember where.
"One might assume that "widow's weeds" must be connected in some convoluted fashion to the "ugly plant" sort of weed one finds in one's garden. (Not that you'll find weeds in my garden, of course. Not since I had it paved.) But, to return to the question, one would be wrong. "Weeds" the plants and "weeds" the mournful getup worn by widows in days of yore are two entirely separate words with unrelated origins. The "ugly, worthless plant" kind of "weed" comes from the Old English word "weod," which meant "grass, herb or weed."
"Weeds" meaning "mourning clothes," on the other hand, comes from a very old Germanic root meaning "clothing," and when this "weed" first appeared in English around A.D. 888, it was used in the singular to mean simply "an article of clothing." By about 1297, "weed" or "weeds" meant a style of clothing typical of an occupation or station in life. One might speak of a priest's "weed" or a beggar's "weeds," for instance. The phrase "widow's weeds," denoting the black veils and other accoutrements of deep mourning, first appeared around 1595, and is the only use of "weeds" in this sense still commonly heard in English."
Now that I think of it, I think I have heard "weeds" used jocularly, to describe someone's dress clothes, but can't remember where.