[Leica] OT: POSH

[gwpics at lycos.co.uk (Gerry Walden)]

It is reputed here in Southampton that the word 'POSH' was written in
chalk on the suitcases of travellers on P & O ships for the reason
given, and explains why no record has been found. The practice of
writing on suitcases still exists today often when loading.

Gerry

Gerry Walden LRPS
www.gwpics.com <http://www.gwpics.com> 
Tel: +44 (0)23 8046 3076


-----Original Message-----
From: lug-bounces+gwpics=lycos.co.uk@leica-users.org
[mailto:lug-bounces+gwpics=lycos.co.uk@leica-users.org] On Behalf Of
Douglas M.Sharp
Sent: 23 January 2005 10:01
To: Leica Users Group
Subject: [Leica] OT: POSH


Just found this on a quite excellent site
http://www.wordorigins.org/wordorp.htm
see also http://www.m-w.com/help/faq/posh.htm
One of those where you can spend (waste?) hours just looking back and
forth. As a fan of old ships I'll stick to the P&O definition. Douglas



Posh
This is another word with an apocryphal acronymic origin. Popular
etymology has 
it that posh is an acronym for Port Out, Starboard Home. Supposedly,
this 
acronym was printed on first-class tickets issued by the Peninsular and
Oriental 
Steam Navigation Company going from England to India. The port side on
the trip 
out would have the coolest cabins (or alternately the cabins with the
best 
view). The same would be true of the starboard cabins on the return
trip. From 
this origin, sprang the usage of the term meaning swank, elegant, or 
fashionable. Unfortunately for this excellent story, no tickets with
Posh 
stamped on them have been found and company records reveal no sign of
the phrase.

The earliest recorded use of posh to mean swank is from the 25 September
1918 
issue of the British humor magazine Punch. In 1903, P.G. Wodehouse in
Tales of 
St. Austin's used push to mean fashionable. Whether this was a printer's
error 
or Wodehouse actually meant to use push is unknown (several later
editors 
"corrected" this to read posh). In contrast, according to Merriam
Webster the 
earliest claim to the acronymic origin dates to 17 October 1935 in the
London 
Times Literary Supplement, where it is claimed to be of American origin.
The 
earliest association with the P&O dates to two years later, almost
twenty years 
after the word's usage was established.

Posh dates back to at least 1867 in the sense of meaning a dandy or fop.
The 
best guess as to its origin is that it derives from Romani, the language
of the 
Rom (commonly known as Gypsies). In Romani, posh means half and is used
in 
monetary terms like posh-houri or half-pence, and posh-kooroona meaning 
half-crown. The progression from money to a fancy dresser to swank is
logical, 
if undocumented. Alternatively, Partridge postulates that the "swanky"
meaning 
of posh may be a contraction of polish.

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