English
maggot
Maggot comes from Middle English magot ‘maggot, bedbug’.
- Middle Englishc. 1150–1500magot‘maggot, bedbug’
- Englishearliest quotation 1620maggot
attested reconstructed ? uncertain or disputed
Lineage
- Middle Englishc. 1150–1500magot‘maggot, bedbug’
- Englishearliest quotation 1620maggot
Earliest quotation: 1620, John Fletcher, Women Pleased: “Are you not mad, my friend? What time o'…”
Formed from made + -ock
The story
From Middle English magot, magat, maked, probably a metathetic alteration of maddock, maðek (‘worm", "maggot’), originally a diminutive form of a base represented by Old English maþa (Scots mathe), from Proto-West Germanic *maþō, from Proto-Germanic *maþô, from the Proto-Indo-European root *mat, which was used in insect names, equivalent to made + -ock. Near-cognates include Dutch made, German Made and Swedish mask, Icelandic maðkur (‘worm, grub, maggot’). The use of maggot to mean a fanciful or whimsical thing derives from the folk belief that a whimsical or crotchety person had maggots in their brain.
Every English word from Middle English magot
Today it means
noun A soft, legless larva of a fly or other dipteran insect, that often eats decomposing organic matter.
Language periods are conventional ranges, not dates for this word.
Etymograph / Middle English magot / maggot