WOW. I am impressed. Not only by the play on words but also by the sheer intelegince shown in the answers. According to my grnadmother (she is 93 yo)the original meaning of the term “doughboys” refer to a small, boiled, suet dumpling, but it was also used by the enemy as a slang for american soldiers. Apparently the enemy were going to “eat them alive”. I guess she must have been but a girl when there were cannibals living in america
I think “bread” as a name for money might be bible-based as in “earning your daily bread”.
Russell:
April 12th, 2012 at 3:58 am
The origin of “Bread” as a name for Money comes from the English Cockney Rhyming Slang term, “Bread and Honey” meaning Money. The term dough could be derived as a further slang term from Bread. Alternatively is has been suggested that it could be rhyming slang of it’s own, derived form the song lyrics, Do ray me far so la te do.
“Do, ray, me”. . . Mon-ey.
Doc:
December 3rd, 2012 at 5:53 pm
Doughboy is also cockney slang for a heavy punch or blow…my mum would always say to me as a kid “i’ll give you such a doughboy in a minute”
Stuart Filler:
March 7th, 2014 at 8:47 am
I’m with Russell and Cockney rhyming slang bread short for bread and honey. Americans came back from WWI with rhyming slang, which drops the second term, so my wife, my trouble and strife, become me trouble, and in a 1920s Damon Runyon tale you get a New York character talking of needing to raise the money for his “shovel and broom,” using the full expression because he’s in NYC and no Cockney and because he is speaking in an affected manner, which is a kind of standard, you can delight in Pynchon’s Bleeding Edge (2013) to get the full flavor
BruisedOrange:
March 29th, 2014 at 1:41 pm
I came here checking to see if there was a connection between “doughboy” and the word “doughty” (valiant, fearless, determined; usually of a warrior).
Merriam-Webster does cite the origin of “doughty” as Middle English, coming from the Old English dohtig.
Anyone know if that’s a long-O vowel sound?
E1:
February 9th, 2015 at 10:45 am
Doc, my East End grandfather (the sweetest, kindest and handsomest man on the planet who knew how to wear a good whistle and titfer – always from Jermyn St/Piccadilly/St.James’s) who would have been a teenager during WW1, used to tell my kid brothers the same: “Behave, or I’ll give you both a doughboy.” A great deterrent, because it would just reduce us all to fits of giggles. He used to tell us ditties, too, very often funny little epitaphs remembered from the graveyard that backed onto his childhood home. My favourite was, “Where ‘ere ye be, let your wind go free, for the stopping of the wind was the death of me.” Truly, an East End Roald Dahl.
terry hardwick:
July 9th, 2015 at 4:03 am
My Dad used to make doughboys for reasons I wont go into and what they were a rubber hose filled with compacted sand and sealed at both ends. Nuw he told me that he used them for hand to hand fighting in the second world war. He also used the saying I gave him a right Doughboy.
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Jason Gillard, Jr.:
May 31st, 2009 at 9:36 am
WOW. I am impressed. Not only by the play on words but also by the sheer intelegince shown in the answers. According to my grnadmother (she is 93 yo)the original meaning of the term “doughboys” refer to a small, boiled, suet dumpling, but it was also used by the enemy as a slang for american soldiers. Apparently the enemy were going to “eat them alive”. I guess she must have been but a girl when there were cannibals living in america
Hope this helps
Jenny:
August 31st, 2009 at 7:23 pm
Here’s a claim to the origin of “bread” as slang for money:
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=112255870
Repeated by NPR, no less.
Regina:
March 17th, 2010 at 4:31 pm
I think “bread” as a name for money might be bible-based as in “earning your daily bread”.
Russell:
April 12th, 2012 at 3:58 am
The origin of “Bread” as a name for Money comes from the English Cockney Rhyming Slang term, “Bread and Honey” meaning Money. The term dough could be derived as a further slang term from Bread. Alternatively is has been suggested that it could be rhyming slang of it’s own, derived form the song lyrics, Do ray me far so la te do.
“Do, ray, me”. . . Mon-ey.
Doc:
December 3rd, 2012 at 5:53 pm
Doughboy is also cockney slang for a heavy punch or blow…my mum would always say to me as a kid “i’ll give you such a doughboy in a minute”
Stuart Filler:
March 7th, 2014 at 8:47 am
I’m with Russell and Cockney rhyming slang bread short for bread and honey. Americans came back from WWI with rhyming slang, which drops the second term, so my wife, my trouble and strife, become me trouble, and in a 1920s Damon Runyon tale you get a New York character talking of needing to raise the money for his “shovel and broom,” using the full expression because he’s in NYC and no Cockney and because he is speaking in an affected manner, which is a kind of standard, you can delight in Pynchon’s Bleeding Edge (2013) to get the full flavor
BruisedOrange:
March 29th, 2014 at 1:41 pm
I came here checking to see if there was a connection between “doughboy” and the word “doughty” (valiant, fearless, determined; usually of a warrior).
Merriam-Webster does cite the origin of “doughty” as Middle English, coming from the Old English dohtig.
Anyone know if that’s a long-O vowel sound?
E1:
February 9th, 2015 at 10:45 am
Doc, my East End grandfather (the sweetest, kindest and handsomest man on the planet who knew how to wear a good whistle and titfer – always from Jermyn St/Piccadilly/St.James’s) who would have been a teenager during WW1, used to tell my kid brothers the same: “Behave, or I’ll give you both a doughboy.” A great deterrent, because it would just reduce us all to fits of giggles. He used to tell us ditties, too, very often funny little epitaphs remembered from the graveyard that backed onto his childhood home. My favourite was, “Where ‘ere ye be, let your wind go free, for the stopping of the wind was the death of me.” Truly, an East End Roald Dahl.
terry hardwick:
July 9th, 2015 at 4:03 am
My Dad used to make doughboys for reasons I wont go into and what they were a rubber hose filled with compacted sand and sealed at both ends. Nuw he told me that he used them for hand to hand fighting in the second world war. He also used the saying I gave him a right Doughboy.