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Joined: Aug 2001
Posts: 10,598 Likes: 1
Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
Joined: Aug 2001
Posts: 10,598 Likes: 1 |
Grew-up-in-and-around-New-York-City-area:
I've heard it both ways - "blind man's buff" and "blind man's bluff." I always assumed one was originally the "right" way, the other an innocent mispronunciation on the part of some child many years ago, maybe several hundred. The meaning wasn't altered any; ultimately the change diffused out and was incorporated into the the common parlance as totally equivalent. By now the two are interchangeable.
(Note the scrupulous avoidance of suggesting which one is "correct" ! )
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Joined: Oct 2000
Posts: 1,346
veteran
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veteran
Joined: Oct 2000
Posts: 1,346 |
I've never heard the bluff variety before
Likewise - which goes a teeny little way to suggesting this could be a US variant.
I think I'd assumed the "buff" to be the bumping up against people the "blindman" does - as in buffeting .
M-W's etymology of buffet is interesting:
Etymology: Middle English, from Old French, diminutive of buffe blow Date: 13th century 1 : a blow especially with the hand 2 : something that strikes with telling force
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Joined: Apr 2000
Posts: 10,542
Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
Joined: Apr 2000
Posts: 10,542 |
OED2 supports the buffet interpretation, giving bluff as an *early spelling variant:
bllind-man's-buff Also 6-7 blindman-buff(e, (-buffet, -bough, -bluff,) 7-9 blindman's-buff. [f. BLIND-MAN + BUFF = buffet, blow, stroke.]
1. A game in which one player is blindfolded, and tries to catch and identify any one of the others, who, on their part, push him about, and make sport with him. 1600 ROWLANDS Let. Humours Blood iv. 64 At hot-cockles, leape-frogge, or blindman-buffe. 1628 GAULE Pract. The. (1629) 231 Others make him [Christ] no better then their Pastime, at no more discreet a Sport then Childs, or Fooles Blind-man-Buffet: Prophecie vnto us, who is he that smote thee? 1634 J. TAYLOR (Water-P.) Gt. Eater Kent, Gregorie Dawson, an English-man, devised the unmatchable mystery of Blind-man-buffe. 1696 Month. Mercury VII. 55 They oblig'd him to play with 'em at Blindman-Buff. 1766 GOLDSM. Vic. W. xi, Mr. Burchell..set the boys and girls to blindman's buff. 1866 R. CHAMBERS Ess. Ser. I. 186 The whole parlour put into disorder by blind man's buff. 2. fig. 1590 Three Lords Lond., Ile to my stall; Love, Lucre, Conscience, blindman buffe to you all. 1643 BRAMHALL Serpent Salve §1 We desire to see what they have done, before we go to blindman's buffet one with another. 1648 C. WALKER Hist. Indep. I. 55 Me thinks..we are compelled to play at blind-man-bough for our lives. 1837 CARLYLE Fr. Rev. I. VI. iii. 278 Government by Blind-man's-buff.
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Joined: Jul 2002
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old hand
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old hand
Joined: Jul 2002
Posts: 742 |
I had never heard blindman's "buff" until this thread, and I ain't bluffing.
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