maggot

From Middle English magot, magotte, probably Anglo-Norman metathetic alteration of maddock (“worm", "maggot”), originally a diminutive form of a base represented by Old English maþa (Scots mathe), from Frankish *maþō, from common Proto-Germanic *maþô, from the Proto-Indo-European root *mat, which was used in insect names, equivalent to made +‎ -ock. Near-cognates include Dutch made, German Made and Swedish mask.

The use of maggot to mean a fanciful or whimsical thing derives from the folk belief that a whimsical or crotchety person had maggots in their brain.

• enPR: măg'ət, IPA^(key): /ˈmæɡət/
  • Homophone: MAGAt

• Audio (US)

  (file)

• Rhymes: -æɡət

maggot (plural maggots)

1. A soft, legless larva of a fly or other dipterous insect, that often eats decomposing organic matter. [from 15th c.]
2. (derogatory) A worthless person. [from 17th c.]

   Drop and give me fifty, maggot.

   • 1971, Richard Carpenter, Catweazle and the Magic Zodiac, Harmondsworth: Puffin Books, page 32:

     "Maggot!" said Catweazle angrily. "Sit thee down!"

3. (now archaic, regional) A whimsy or fancy. [from 17th c.]
   • 1620, John Fletcher, Women Pleased, III.iv:

     Are you not mad, my friend? What time o' th' moon is't? / Have not you maggots in your brain?

   • 1778, Frances Burney, Journals & Letters, Penguin, published 2001, page 100:

     ‘I am ashamed of him! how can he think of humouring you in such maggots!’

   • 1863, Sheridan Le Fanu, The House by the Churchyard:

     […] If you draw, Sir, there's one prospect up the river, by the mills—upon my conscience—but you don't draw?'
     No answer.
     'A little, Sir, maybe? Just for a maggot, I'll wager—like my good lady, Mrs. Toole.'

4. (slang) A fan of the American metal band Slipknot.
   • 2004, “Pulse of the Maggots”, performed by Slipknot:

     (We) We are the new diabolic
     (We) We are the bitter bucolic
     If I have to give my life, you can have it
     (We) We are the pulse of the maggots

• (soft legless larva): grub

• mawk
• mawkish

maggot (third-person singular simple present maggots, present participle maggoting, simple past and past participle maggoted)

1. (transitive) To rid (an animal) of maggots.
   • 1950, Frederick Daniel Smith, Barbara Wilcox, Sold for Two Farthings, page 82:

     In the summer I had to get the sheep penned twice a day to maggot them and I needed a good dog.

maggot (comparative more maggot, superlative most maggot)

1. (colloquial, Australia) Alternative form of maggoted (“drunk; intoxicated”)