The etymology of
**** has given rise to a great deal of speculation, which should be regarded skeptically. The authoritative
Oxford English Dictionary is quite cautious in providing an etymology for this word. In the quotation below, the dictionary's usual abbreviations are spelled out for clarity:
Early modern English
****,
fuk, answering to a
Middle English type *
fuken (weak verb) [which is] not found; ulterior etymology unknown. Synonymous
German ficken cannot be shown to be related. The first known occurrence, in code because of its unacceptability, is in a poem composed in a mixture of
Latin and English sometime before
1500. The poem, which satirizes the
Carmelite friars of
Cambridge, England, takes its title, Flen flyys, from the first words of its opening line, Flen, flyys, and freris; that is, Fleas, flies, and friars. The line that contains **** reads Non sunt in coeli, quia gxddbov xxkxzt pg ifmk. The Latin words Non sunt in coeli, quia, mean They (the friars) are not in heaven, since. The code gxddbov xxkxzt pg ifmk is easily broken by simply substituting the preceding letter in the alphabet, keeping in mind differences in the alphabet and in spelling between then and now: i was then used for both i and j; v was used for both u and v; and vv was used for w. This yields fvccant (a fake Latin form) vvivys of heli. The whole thus reads in translation: They are not in heaven since they **** wives of
Ely (a town near Cambridge).
As the OED notes, some have attempted to draw a connection to the
German word
ficken (to ****, in dialects: to rub, to scratch, and historically to strike).
A possible etymology is suggested by the fact that the Common Germanic
fuk-, by an application of
Grimm's law, would have as its most likely
Indo-European ancestor *
pug-, which appears in Latin and
Greek words meaning "fight" and "fist". In early Common Germanic the word was likely used at first as a slang or euphemistic replacement for an older word for "intercourse", and then became the usual word for "intercourse".
Other possible connections are to Latin
futuere (hence the
French foutre, the
Italian fottere, the vulgar peninsular
Spanish follar and
joder, and the
Portuguese foder). However, there is considerable doubt and no clear lineage for these derivations. These roots, even if
cognate, are not the original Indo-European word for
to ****; that root is likely *
h3yebh-, ("
h3" is the H3
laryngeal) which is attested in
Sanskrit (
yabhati) and the
Slavic languages (
Russian yebat`), among others: compare Greek "oiphô" (verb), and Greek "zephyros" (noun, ref. a Greek belief that the west wind caused pregnancy). However, Wayland Young (who agrees that these words are related) argues that they derive from the Indo-European *
bhu- or *
bhug-, believed to be the root of "to be", "to grow", and "to build". [Young, 1964]
Spanish
follar has a different root; according to Spanish etymologists, the Spanish verb "follar" (attested in the
19th century) derives from "fuelle" (bellows) from Latin "folle(m)" < Indo-European "bhel-"; ancient Spanish verb folgar (attested in the
15th century) derived from Latin "follicare", ultimately from follem/follis too.
Some have supposed that
**** has cognates in other Germanic languages, such as
Middle Dutch fokken (to thrust, to copulate), dialectical Norwegian
fukka (to copulate), and dialectical
Swedish focka (to strike, copulate) and
fock (penis). A very similar set of Latin words that have not yet been related to these are those for hearth or fire, "focus/focum" (with a short o), fiery, "focilis", Latin and Italian for hearthly/hearthling, "foc[c]ia/focac[c]ia", and fire, "focca", and the Italian for bonfire, "focere". But these words came from
New Latin, centuries after Middle Dutch.
There is perhaps even an original
Celtic derivation;
futuere being related to
battuere (to strike, to copulate); which may be related to
Irish bot and Manx
bwoid (penis). The argument is that
battuere and
futuere (like the Irish and Manx words) comes from the Celtic
*bactuere (to pierce), from the root
buc- (a point). An even earlier root may be the
Egyptian petcha (to copulate), which has a highly suggestive
hieroglyph. Or perhaps Latin "futuere" came from the root "fu", Common Indo-European "bhu", meaning "be, become" and originally referred to procreation.
. For example, while it may not be swearing to say "kiss off," if the intent behind it is the same, then there really isn't much difference.
