Sunday Rest: gammon. Word Not To Use Today.

Gammon is the salted or smoked uncooked flesh of a pig's leg.

Once it's cooked, it's called ham.

But although gammon isn't the most elegant of words, it hasn't bothered me until the last few months, when it's acquired a new meaning.

A gammon is now a white no-longer-young person who isn't nearly as left-wing as the person using the word. The idea is that the complexion of an angry white man, or perhaps a white man who's outdoors a lot (and therefore not from the big city) is the colour of gammon.

I don't know about you, but that strikes me as both racist and unpleasant.


photo: Beck from East Midlands, United Kingdom

Word Not To Use Today: gammon. The meat word comes from the Old Northern French gambe, leg. 

The gammon which is part of the game backgammon is to do with the Middle English gamen, which means game, and this is probably the idea behind gammon and spinach! an expression formerly used to mean nonsense!

There's also a gammon which is a way of tying a mast to a ship, and this is probably to do with the way a gammon joint is tied for cooking.