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Pig Latin is a language game, argot, or cant in which words in English are altered, usually by adding a fabricated suffix or by moving the onset or initial consonant or consonant cluster of a word to the end of the word and adding a vocalic syllable (usually -ay or /eɪ/) to create such a suffix.^[1] For example, Wikipedia would become Ikipediaway (taking the 'W' and 'ay' to create a suffix).

The objective is often to conceal the words from others not familiar with the rules. The reference to Latin is a deliberate misnomer; Pig Latin is simply a form of argot or jargon unrelated to Latin, and the name is used for its English connotations as a strange and foreign-sounding language. It is most often used by young children as a fun way to confuse people unfamiliar with Pig Latin.

Origins and history

Early mentions of Pig Latin or Hog Latin describe what we would today call Dog Latin, a type of parody Latin.^{[citation needed]} Examples of this predate even Shakespeare, whose 1598 play, Love's Labour's Lost, includes a reference to dog Latin:^[2]

Costard: Go to; thou hast it ad dungill, at the fingers' ends, as they say.
Holofernes: O, I smell false Latine; dunghill for unguem.
— Love's Labour's Lost, William Shakespeare

An 1866 article describes a "hog latin" that has some similarities to current Pig Latin. The article says, "He adds as many new letters as the boys in their 'hog latin,' which is made use of to mystify eavesdroppers. A boy asking a friend to go with him says, 'Wig-ge you-ge go-ge wig-ge me-ge?' The other, replying in the negative says, 'Noge, Ige woge.' ".^[3] This is similar to Língua do Pê.

Another early mention of the name was in Putnam's Magazine in May 1869: "I had plenty of ammunition in reserve, to say nothing, Tom, of our pig Latin. 'Hoggibus, piggibus et shotam damnabile grunto,' and all that sort of thing," although the jargon is dog Latin.

The Atlantic January 1895 also included a mention of the subject: "They all spoke a queer jargon which they themselves had invented. It was something like the well-known 'pig Latin' that all sorts of children like to play with."

The modern version of Pig Latin appears in a 1919 Columbia Records album containing what sounds like the modern variation, by a singer named Arthur Fields. The song, called "Pig Latin Love", is followed by the subtitle "I-Yay Ove-Lay oo-yay earie-day".^[4] The Three Stooges used it on multiple occasions, most notably Tassels in the Air, a 1938 short where Moe Howard attempts to teach Curley Howard how to use it, thereby conveying the rules to the audience. In an earlier (1934) episode, Three Little Pigskins, Larry Fine attempts to impress a woman with his skill in Pig Latin, but it turns out that she knows it, too. No explanation of the rules is given. A few months prior in 1934, in the Our Gang short film Washee Ironee, Spanky tries to speak to an Asian boy by using Pig Latin.^[5]

Ginger Rogers sang a verse of "We're in the Money" in pig Latin in an elaborate Busby Berkeley production number in the film Gold Diggers of 1933.^[6] The film, the third highest grossing of that year, was inducted into the National Film Registry and that song included in the all-time top 100 movie songs by the American Film Institute. Merle Travis ends his song "When My Baby Double Talks To Me" with the phrase, "What a aybybay", where the last word is Pig Latin for "baby".

A 1947 newspaper question and answer column describes the pig Latin as we understand it today. It describes moving the first letter to the end of a word and then adding "ay".^[7]

Two Pig Latin words that have entered mainstream American English are "ixnay" or "icksnay", the Pig Latin version of "nix" (itself a borrowing of German nichts^[8]), which is used as a general negative; and "amscray", Pig Latin for "scram", meaning "go away" or "get out of here".^[9]^[10]^[11]^[12]

Rules

For words that begin with consonant sounds, the initial consonant is moved to the end of the word, then "ay" is added, as in the following examples:^[13]

"pig" = "igpay"
"latin" = "atinlay"
"banana" = "ananabay"

When words begin with consonant clusters (multiple consonants that form one sound), the whole sound is moved to the end (before adding "ay") when speaking or writing.^[14]

"friends" = "iendsfray"
"smile" = "ilesmay"
"string" = "ingstray"

For words that begin with vowel sounds, one just adds "hay", "way", "nay" or "yay" to the end. Examples are:

"eat" = "eatway"
"omelet" = "omeletway"
"are" = "areway"

An alternative convention for words beginning with vowel sounds, one moves the initial vowel(s) along with the first consonant or consonant cluster. This usually only works for words with more than one syllable and offers a more unique variant of the words in keeping with the mysterious, unrecognizable sounds of the converted words. Examples are:

"every" = "eryevay"
"omelet" = "eletomay"
"another" = "otheranay"

Sentence structure remains the same as it would in English. Pronunciation of some words may be a little difficult for beginners, but people can easily understand Pig Latin with practice.

Current usage

Pig Latin is mainly used for fun. It can also be used by children or young adults to hide conversation. For example, a conversation between two people in the presence of an unwanted other may consist of: "ehay isway eryvay illysay" = "he is very silly".

In other languages

In the German-speaking area, varieties of Pig Latin include Kedelkloppersprook^[de], which originated around Hamburg harbour, and Mattenenglisch that was used in the Matte, the traditional working-class neighborhood of Bern.^{[citation needed]} Though Mattenenglisch has fallen out of use since the mid-20th century, it is still cultivated by voluntary associations.^[15] A characteristic of the Mattenenglisch Pig Latin is the complete substitution of the first vowel by i, in addition to the usual moving of the initial consonant cluster and the adding of ee.

The Swedish equivalent of Pig Latin is Fikonspråket ("Fig language" – see Language game § List of common language games).

The Finnish Pig Latin is known as Kontinkieli ("container language"). After each word you add the word kontti "container", then switch the first syllables, So every sentence is converted to twice as many pseudo-words. For example,"wikipedia" ⟶ "wikipedia kontti" ⟶ "kokipedia wintti". So converting the sentence "I love you" ("Minä rakastan sinua") would result in "konä mintti kokastan rantti konua sintti".

In Italian, the alfabeto farfallino uses a similar encoding; in Spanish, a similar language variation is called Jeringonza. Spanish as used in Latin America has a further form, Vesre, in which the order of syllables is reversed.

In Estonian, the encoding used is 'bi' after the first syllable, e.g. "mina" ('me' in English) would be "mibina".^[16]

Another equivalent of Pig Latin is used throughout the Slavic-speaking parts of the Balkans. It is called "Šatra" (/sha-tra/)or "Šatrovački" (/shatro-vachki/) and was used in crime-related and street language. For instance, the Balkan slang name for marijuana (trava – meaning "grass") turns to "vutra"; the Balkan slang name for cocaine (belo – meaning "white") turns to lobe, a pistol (pištolj) turns to štoljpi, bro (brate) turns to tebra. In the past few years it has become widely used between teenage immigrants in former Yugoslavian countries.

French has the loucherbem (or louchébem, or largonji^[17]) coded language, which supposedly was originally used by butchers (boucher in French).^[18] In loucherbem, the leading consonant cluster is moved to the end of the word (as in Pig Latin) and replaced by an L, and then a suffix is added at the end of the word (-oche, -em, -oque, etc., depending on the word). Example: combien (how much) = lombienquès. Similar coded languages are verlan and langue de feu (see fr:Javanais (argot). A few louchébem words have become usual French words: fou (crazy) = loufoque or louftingue, portefeuille (wallet) = larfeuille, en douce (on the quiet) = en loucedé.

Similarly, the French argot verlan, in which the order of the syllables within a word is inverted, is also widely used. The term "verlan" is an autological example of the process it describes, derived from inverting the syllables of l'envers, meaning "reverse." Documented initially in the 19th century, Verlan was used as a coded language by criminals in effort to conceal illicit activities from others, including police. Over time, particularly in the late 20th century, its use has proliferated in suburban areas predominantly inhabited by migrant workers. Verlan has served as a language bridge between many of these diverse communities, and its popularity encouraged its spread into advertising, film scripts, French rap and hip-hop music, media, and some French dictionaries. In some cases, Verlanned words have even supplanted their original forms.^[19]

Here are some French words that have been Verlanned and their English meaning:^[20]

French	Verlan	English
bizarre	zarbi	weird
Black (Eng.)	kebla	black person
bloqué	kéblo	blocked
bonjour	jourbon	hello
classe	secla	class
fais chier	fais iech	it makes one angry
femme	meuf	woman
flic	keuf	cop
fou	ouf	crazy
jobard	barjot	crazy
l'envers	verlan	reverse
louche	chelou	shady
mec	keum	man
mère	reum	mother
métro	tromé	train
musique	sicmu	music
père	reup	father
piscine	cinepi	pool (swimming)
pourri	ripou	corrupt
truc	keutru	stuff
vas-y	zyva	go for it

Notes

^ "What exactly is Pig Latin, is it a language? And how is it a mystery? - Everything After Z by Dictionary.com". Everything After Z by Dictionary.com. 2010-10-05. Retrieved 2018-08-27.
^ "What's the origin of pig Latin?". The Straight Dope. June 2004.
^ Wakeman, George (1886). Sound and Sense (in "The Galaxy: A Magazine of Entertaining Reading, Volume 1"). p. 638. Retrieved 13 December 2015.
^ I Always Wondered: Where did Pig Latin come from? Archived 2016-01-29 at the Wayback Machine
The consensus seems to be that the version of Pig Latin we know today was born sometime in the 20th century. In 1919 Columbia records released an album with Arthur Fields singing "Pig Latin Love". The Subtitle "I-Yay Ove-Lay oo-yay earie-day" indicates that this is the modern form of Pig Latin we recognize today. I was able to scrounge up a photograph of the 1919 sheet music on eBay. Below the Pig Latin subtitle is the translation, "(I love you dearie)", suggesting that perhaps this form of Pig Latin hadn't taken root among the general public yet.
^ "- YouTube". YouTube.
^ Trippy Ginger Rogers Pig Latin. YouTube
^ "Answers to Questions - The Haskins' Service". Reading Eagle. 28 January 1947. p. 12. Retrieved 13 December 2015.
^ Oxford English Dictionary, s.v.
^ Blake, Barry J. (2010). Secret Language: Codes, Tricks, Spies, Thieves, and Symbols. OUP Oxford. ISBN 978-0-19-161471-2.
^ Miller, D. Gary (2014). English Lexicogenesis. OUP Oxford. ISBN 978-0-19-968988-0.
^ Hendrickson, Robert (1998). QPB Encyclopedia of Word and Phrase Origins. Facts on File. ISBN 9780965379458.
^ McGraw-Hill Education 3 MCAT Practice Tests, Third Edition. McGraw Hill Professional. 2017. ISBN 9781259859632.
^ "Useful phrases in Pig Latin (IgpaAtinlay)". www.omniglot.com. Retrieved 2017-01-03.
^ "How to Speak Pig Latin".
^ "Matteänglisch-Club Bärn - Wer wir sind". www.matteaenglisch.ch. Retrieved 2024-06-21.
^ Bi keel. folklore.ee
^ "LARGONJI : Définition de LARGONJI". Cnrtl.fr. Retrieved 2014-03-10.
^ Françoise Robert l'Argenton (1991). "Larlépem largomuche du louchébem. Parler l'argot du boucher". Langue Française (in French). 90 n° 1. Parlures argotiques: 113–125. doi:10.3406/lfr.1991.6200. Retrieved 2014-03-10.
^ Stille, Alexander (2002-08-17). "Backward runs French. Reels the mind. Verlan, a kind of code among immigrants, both confuses and intrigues". The New York Times.
^ Davis, J.J. (Autumn 2004). "Autumn, 2004, Vol. 29 Issue 3, p7, 2 p". Verbatim. 29: 7.

References

Barlow, Jessica. 2001. "Individual differences in the production of initial consonant sequences in Pig Latin." Lingua 111:667-696.
Cowan, Nelson. 1989. "Acquisition of Pig Latin: A Case Study." Journal of Child Language 16.2:365-386.
Day, R. 1973. "On learning 'secret languages.'" Haskins Laboratories Status Report on Speech Research 34:141-150.
Haycock, Arthur. "Pig Latin." American Speech 8:3.81.
McCarthy, John. 1991. "Reduplicative Infixation in Secret Languages" [L'Infixation reduplicative dans les langages secrets]. Langages 25.101:11-29.
Vaux, Bert and Andrew Nevins. 2003. "Underdetermination in language games: Survey and analysis of Pig Latin dialects." Linguistic Society of America Annual Meeting, Atlanta.