Mysteries of vernacular Fizzle Jessica Oreck and Rachael Teel
Transcriber: Andrea McDonough
Reviewer: Jessica Ruby
Mysteries of vernacular:
Fizzle,
to end weakly
or to fail,
to die out.
The definition of fizzle
likely links back to the Old English word fist,
which meant stink.
In the mid-fifteenth century,
fist developed into the verb fisten,
to break wind,
which eventually lead to the modern word feisty,
but that’s another story.
In its earliest form,
as a variant of fisten,
fizzle had a very specific meaning:
to break wind without noise.
Surprisingly, considering this initial definition,
by the 1800s, the word fizzle referred instead
to a specific sound,
rather graphically,
to the sputtering or hissing of a gas or liquid
being forced out of a narrow opening.
The figurative sense of the word,
a weak ending,
is thus understandable within the context
of a flame consuming the last drops of oil in a lantern
or a valve drawing out the contents
of the bottom of a cask.
Though perhaps not derived directly
from this subsiding verb,
our modern meaning of fizzle
developed as slang in the 1800s.
Originally used on college campuses
to describe failure,
specifically on an exam,
it wasn’t long before the word came to mean
exactly what it does today
and was quickly and widely adopted.