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Miss Poubelle recently had the pleasure of spending a few weeks in Montreal, attending the Outgames and studying French. She was particularly interested in learning about French words for gay men and lesbians. One common French term is tapette, approximately equivalent to "fag" in English. Blanche wanted to know the origin of the word, and was led on a merry chase through French etymological dictionaries in search of an answer.

The first place to look for an answer is in the other meanings of tapette. There are plenty of these! Tapette is the diminutive of the word tape, "slap," and is related to a verb taper, "to beat, slam, slap." (And the English verb to tap in the sense "touch lightly" most likely comes from the Old French taper.) One might think that tapette would mean "little slap," but this is a rather rare sense of the word.

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uch more frequently tapette refers to various instruments used for slapping, beating, or slamming other things. One very common use of tapette in modern French is "flyswatter," presumably because a flyswatter is used for slapping at flies. Related to this is tapette as the name of a stick used for beating rugs or clothes. And just to keep things interesting, a tapette is also a stick used for pushing a cork into a bottle, a printers' tool (probably for pushing type into a form), a tool that cement makers use, and a kind of mousetrap.

Apart from these meanings, the French historical dictionary says that tapette is also the name of an obscure game that involves throwing a ball toward a wall and trying to get it as close as possible to another ball. This game sounds vaguely like other games, like the Italian bocce or the French boules, but Blanche can't find out much more about it. Blanche supposes that the origin of this sense of tapette has to do with the balls hitting against each other in the game.

Tapette is also slang for "tongue," and from this meaning is also related to "gossip." The relation of these meanings to the others is much harder to see, since there's no obvious hitting, slapping, or beating involved. (Though perhaps English idioms like "flap the tongue" provide some clue to the connection.)

So which of these meanings is the origin of tapette as "homosexual"? Mousetrap? Flyswatter? Rugbeater? Cork pusher? Printers' tool? Tongue? Ballgame? With enough imagination, it is probably possible to come up with some story to connect each of these to homosexuality. But luckily we can use evidence from the dates of these meanings to help us decide the most plausible origin.

Tapette as "homosexual" is first attested in 1854. So it is not very plausible to connect it with any sense of tapette that occurs after that date. This criterion lets us rule out "flyswatter" and "rugbeater" (1929), "tongue" (1866), "cement maker's tool" (1904). The obscure ballgame just barely makes the cut, being first attested in 1845.

But the most plausible candidate in terms of date and meaning is probably "cork pusher." It dates to 1562, and it is the oldest of the many different meanings. There's also a pretty clear connection between the meanings-- a homosexual man and a cork pusher both shove a long straight object into a tight hole. There are a few English terms for gay men that also use "pushing" or "shoving" imagery, such as "fudge-packer."

Miss Poubelle was initially attracted to the idea that the tapette ballgame might be the source of the homosexual sense of the word, since she likes the image of balls banging into each other. But the late date of tapette for a ballgame (1845) probably doesn't give it enough time to be a plausible source. The other problem is that tapette seems to have been regarded as an offensive term when it was first used (though some modern gay Francophones are trying to reclaim it). For the average 19th-century French speaker, "cork pusher" seems like a much more likely insult than "ball player."

So that leaves us with only one remaining mystery. The French dictionary tells us that tapette means "passive pederast," or in modern terms "bottom." But shouldn't the one who pushes the cork or packs the fudge be considered the top, rather than the bottom? In terms of clear logic, that must be so. But then not even the fabled French intellect is able to make logical sense of homophobia.