Posted 04/07/2005 11:03 pm
Dug this up on Google.........
Mike
Dixie: Many theories have been advanced in vain efforts to account
satisfactorily for this term. Those that occur most frequently are:
1. The word preserves the name of a kind slave owner on Manhattan
Island, a Mr. Dixy. His rule was so kindly that "Dixy's Land" became
famed far and wide as an Elysium abounding in material comforts.
2. Ten dollar notes issued by the Citizens Bank of Louisiana before the
Civil War bore the French 'dix', ten, on the reverse side and were
consequently known as 'dixes' or 'Dixie’s'. Hence Louisiana and
eventually the South in general came to be known as the land of
'Dixie’s' or 'Dixie’s land'
3. Dixie is derived somehow from Dixon of Mason and Dixon's line.
(For non-USens, the Mason-Dixon line is a survey line fixing the boundary between the states of Pennsylvania and Maryland.)
(By the by, there are 2 other meanings for Dixie, or dixy: a British usage meaning an iron kettle or pot, used to make tea or stew, and a Utah Mormon usage for "All that part of Mormon Dom south of the rim of the Great Basin...")
For the fourth etymology, looking in _Webster’s New World Dictionary of American English_, Victoria Neufeldt, Ed. (Webster’s New World, 1988) we find:
Dixie: from 'Dixie' (earlier, Dixie's Land), title of song (1859)
By Daniel D. Emmett (1815-1904), U.S. songwriter, after 'Dixie',
originally name of a Negro character in a minstrel play (1850)
Excepting the above, the song 'Dixie' is the earliest print usage of the term cited in any of the references I looked at. The song was immensely popular and the Encyclopedia Britannica (1984) says it was the unofficial anthem of the Confederacy during the Civil War. I suspect that the song spread and popularized the term.
The Enc. Britannica says D.D. Emmett was born and died in Mount Vernon, Ohio, and organized one of first minstrel show troupes in 1843. "['Dixie']... was originally a 'walk-around', or concluding number for a minstrel show." The _Dictionary of Word & Phrase Origins_, William and Mary Morris (Harper&Row, 1962) says the song was first performed in New York. (This later edition also seems to have modified its entries on Dixie and Dixieland from the edition Brian Leibowitz cites above: The Dixie entry says "See Mason-Dixon Line.” then says there's no connection between Dixon and Dixie and repeats the Louisiana banknote theory, as above. However, under the entry for Dixieland, "There are many stories about this word. Perhaps the most credible is [Louisiana banknote theory]. Another fanciful story [Manhattan slave owner theory]. That sounds pretty farfetched to me.") Considering that 'Dixie' was composed by a "Buckeye" (an Ohio-an, for you non-Americans) for New Yorkers, in black dialect ("In Dixie Lann whar I was bawn in, Arly on one frosty mawnin"), I truly wonder if D.D.Emmett was talking about "the South", even though the original song also said "Away! away! away! Down South in Dixie".
MikeDixie: Many theories have been advanced in vain efforts to account
satisfactorily for this term. Those that occur most frequently are:
1. The word preserves the name of a kind slave owner on Manhattan
Island, a Mr. Dixy. His rule was so kindly that "Dixy's Land" became
famed far and wide as an Elysium abounding in material comforts.
2. Ten dollar notes issued by the Citizens Bank of Louisiana before the
Civil War bore the French 'dix', ten, on the reverse side and were
consequently known as 'dixes' or 'Dixie’s'. Hence Louisiana and
eventually the South in general came to be known as the land of
'Dixie’s' or 'Dixie’s land'
3. Dixie is derived somehow from Dixon of Mason and Dixon's line.
(For non-USens, the Mason-Dixon line is a survey line fixing the boundary between the states of Pennsylvania and Maryland.)
(By the by, there are 2 other meanings for Dixie, or dixy: a British usage meaning an iron kettle or pot, used to make tea or stew, and a Utah Mormon usage for "All that part of Mormon Dom south of the rim of the Great Basin...")
For the fourth etymology, looking in _Webster’s New World Dictionary of American English_, Victoria Neufeldt, Ed. (Webster’s New World, 1988) we find:
Dixie: from 'Dixie' (earlier, Dixie's Land), title of song (1859)
By Daniel D. Emmett (1815-1904), U.S. songwriter, after 'Dixie',
originally name of a Negro character in a minstrel play (1850)
Excepting the above, the song 'Dixie' is the earliest print usage of the term cited in any of the references I looked at. The song was immensely popular and the Encyclopedia Britannica (1984) says it was the unofficial anthem of the Confederacy during the Civil War. I suspect that the song spread and popularized the term.
The Enc. Britannica says D.D. Emmett was born and died in Mount Vernon, Ohio, and organized one of first minstrel show troupes in 1843. "['Dixie']... was originally a 'walk-around', or concluding number for a minstrel show." The _Dictionary of Word & Phrase Origins_, William and Mary Morris (Harper&Row, 1962) says the song was first performed in New York. (This later edition also seems to have modified its entries on Dixie and Dixieland from the edition Brian Leibowitz cites above: The Dixie entry says "See Mason-Dixon Line.” then says there's no connection between Dixon and Dixie and repeats the Louisiana banknote theory, as above. However, under the entry for Dixieland, "There are many stories about this word. Perhaps the most credible is [Louisiana banknote theory]. Another fanciful story [Manhattan slave owner theory]. That sounds pretty farfetched to me.") Considering that 'Dixie' was composed by a "Buckeye" (an Ohio-an, for you non-Americans) for New Yorkers, in black dialect ("In Dixie Lann whar I was bawn in, Arly on one frosty mawnin"), I truly wonder if D.D.Emmett was talking about "the South", even though the original song also said "Away! away! away! Down South in Dixie".
