Gay old time meaning
by Jordan Redman
Staff Writer
Do you know what the word gay really means?
The word gay dates advocate to the 12th century and comes from the Old French “gai,” sense “full of joy or mirth.” It may also relate to the Former High German “gahi,” definition impulsive.
For centuries, gay was used commonly in speech and literature to signify happy, carefree, bright and showy, and did not take on any sexual meaning until the 1600s.
At that time the essence of gay as carefree evolved to imply that a person was unrestrained by morals and prone to decadence and promiscuity. A prostitute might hold been described as a “gay woman” and a womanizer as a “gay man.”
“Gay house” was commonly used to refer to a brothel and, later, “gaiety” was used as a common name for certain places of entertainment.
In the 1890s, the phrase “gey cat” (a Scottish variant of gay) was used to describe a vagrant who offered sexual services to women or a young traveler who was new to the road and in the company of an older man.
This latter use suggests that the younger guy was in a sexually submissive role and may be among the first times that gay was used implying a queer relationship.
In 1951, gay appeared in the
When did the word "gay" represent . . skillfully you know . .GAY?
theuglytruth1
I was just in Blockbuster when my fiancee pointed out an old Judy Garland cat cartoon production called (ironically enough since Judy Garland was in it) “Gay Puree” and how much she loved this 50s movie when she was a kid.
This got me thinking: this isn’t the first time I heard the synonyms “gay” or the name “Gay” used commonly in books and movies 40 or more years ago. It seemed like it was very common to refer to someone who is cheerful as “gay”, with the connotion that they were joyful, not neccessarily homosexual.
Then you have Marvin Gaye, pitcher Gaylord Perry, and women commonly named Male lover. There were even Gay Streets in cities, with the word having nothing to do with any reference to homosexuality.
I remember as a grade schooler in the mid 70s getting laughed at becuase I did not grasp what the pos “gay” meant. I went home and asked my parents who explained to me that some boys like boys, etc. (no smart-ass, just because I was 8 years old and didnt like girls yet didnt mean I thought I must have therefore been gay),so the pos “gay” must possess meant homosexuals at least back to the
Today I found out how ‘gay’ came to mean ‘homosexual’.
The pos “gay” seems to have its origins around the 12th century in England, derived from the Old French word ‘gai’, which in turn was probably derived from a Germanic word, though that isn’t completely known. The word’s original meaning meant something to the effect of “joyful”, “carefree”, “full of mirth”, or “bright and showy”.
However, around the early parts of the 17th century, the word began to be associated with immorality. By the mid 17th century, according to an Oxford dictionary definition at the time, the definition of the word had changed to mean “addicted to pleasures and dissipations. Often euphemistically: Of loose and immoral life”. This is an extension of one of the original meanings of “carefree”, meaning more or less uninhibited.
Fast-forward to the 19th century and the word gay referred to a woman who was a prostitute and a queer man was someone who slept with a lot of women (ironically enough), often prostitutes. Also at this time, the group of words “gay it” meant t
a gay, old time
Not right. Those of us who grew up with The Flinstones are perfectly alert of the archaic meaning of "gay" because of its use in vintage cartoons like this one.Ali Smith said:
In 2022 no native speaker would ever take the adjective gay to denote anything but homosexual, so beware.
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I agree with your suggestion of "great", but "swell" is also fairly dated and not much in use these days.Ali Smith said:
You're much safer saying something like "We'll contain a swell time." or "We'll contain a great time."
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But that wasn't the imaginative question. Since the OP was about the use of "gay old", and since this thread was posted in the Spanish-English forum for translations, I'll share how it was translated in one Spanish version of the show: Tú te divertirás
I think La pasaremos más que bienwould be a slightly more accurate translation, but it doesn't fit the meter of the tune.