Distinctly Montana Magazine

D I S T I N C T L Y M O N T A N A M A G A Z I N E • S P R I N G 2 0 1 9 62 D E PA R T M E N T H E R I TA G E W I L D W E S T W O R D S with CHRYSTI THE WORDSMITH I'm no mycolo- gist, nor really even a mycophile. But I love the weird vocabulary that tags along with this science. If you're not familiar with the word mycology, it means "the scientific study of mushrooms and other fungi," and it derives from the classic Greek word for fungus, mykes. A mycophile is a "mushroom lover." e Oxford English Dictionary's historical database suggests the term mycology showed up in print in 1830; mycophile in 1885. Mycology has contributed some weird and wonderful words to the English language. Mushrooms are a type of fungus, and that word comes ultimately from Greek sphon- gos, meaning "sponge." e tiny underground filaments beneath a growing mushroom are called hyphae (HI-fee), from a Greek term meaning "web." e visible part of the mushroom is supported by a stipe, a Latin-based word meaning "tree-trunk, post." en there are the colorful common names of mush- rooms, many native to Montana: stinkhorn, fly agaric, shaggy mane, death cap, hen of the woods, chanterelle. But perhaps the most curious of them all is the word mushroom itself. At first glance, mushroom appears to be a portmanteau, or a mash-up of two existing words to produce a new one. Not so. Instead, mushroom is an Old English speaker's attempt to pronounce mousseron, the 14th century French word for the edible fungus. Mousseron, in turn, is probably related to the word moss, upon which mushrooms often grow. Perhaps our linguistic predecessors would have been better off staying with their native English word toadstool, easier to pronounce and very clever to suggest furniture for amphibians. Today we use the old word toadstool to refer to inedible, poisonous mushrooms. Interestingly, of all the western European languages, English is the only one hanging on to mushroom. In German, it's Pilz; Spanish, hongo or seta; Italian, fungo. And the French, who gave English speakers mushroom so many centuries ago, now call the edible fungus champignon. e word buff plays a multiplicity of roles in the English language. Buff can be the name of a color, and a synonym of "naked." To buff up is to clean or pol- ish; and a buff is an ardent fan or enthusiast: sports buff, camera buff, etc. ough the word appears to glance off at schizophrenic angles, all these senses of buff have the same source, and that's the word buffalo. Buffalo comes from the Greek word boubalos, the name of a type of African antelope, and later, the domesticated Asian water buffalo and Africa's cape buffalo. In the early 1600s, English speakers placed the word on the indigenous North American bison. Fast-forward to the 19th century, when hundreds of thousands of buffalo hides were shipped from the American plains to the urban east. ere, they were converted into coats, shirts, robes and cloths, raising the profile of the word buff in American English. e light tan we call buff comes from the color of treated buffalo hide. e sueded skins were also used to polish or buff up brass, copper and sil- ver. To be nude or, as we say, in the buff compares the color of some naked human skin to the light tan of a buffalo hide. e "enthusiast" sense of the word made its appearance in American English in the early 20th century. e Oxford English Dictionary's word watchers trace it to a Feb. 4, 1903 edition of the New York Sun: "e Buffs are men and boys whose love of fires, fire-fighting and firemen is a predominant characteristic." ese fire fighters got their moniker from the water-resistant buffalo shirts they wore as part of their uniform. In a 1907 book about fire fighters, the author writes, "e 'buff ' is a private citizen who is a fol- lower, friend, and devoted admirer of the firemen." So the word came to refer to the firemen in their "buff " uniforms as well as the devoted fan of the firefighter. Now, the word describes loyal fans of any stripe. Historical citations down through the decades refer to choo-choo buffs, hi-fi buffs and ballet buffs, all descendants of their etymological ancestors, the English buffalo and the Greek boubalos. TIM WHEELER M U S H R O O M B U F F ( A L O ) Morchella snyderi AT FIRST GLANCE, MUSHROOM APPEARS TO BE A PORTMANTEAU, OR A MASH-UP OF TWO EXISTING WORDS TO PRODUCE A NEW ONE. NOT SO.

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