How did the word ‘faggot’ become a derogatory name for gay men?

In the thirteenth century, a faggot was a bundle of wood or twigs bound together, such as the ones carried by heretics to feed the fires that would burn them at the stake. Heretics who recanted were required to wear an embroidered figure of a faggot on their sleeves. It wasn’t until 1914 that the slang word faggot first appeared in the United States as a reference to a male homosexual, probably derived from the earlier reference to an annoying woman. The abbreviation fag surfaced in 1921.

There is a misconception that male homosexuals were called faggots because they were burned at the stake, but this notion is an urban legend. Homosexuals were sometimes burned alive in Europe, but by the time England made homosexuality a capital offence in 1533, hanging was the prescribed punishement.

The Yiddish word for male homosexual is faygele, which literally means “little bird.”

The English word faggot is derived from the Latin fasces via the French fagot, meaning “a bundle of wood.”

@Picklebobble2 and oddly reading above we find out if that Original Latin word for bundle of sticks is also the root word for fascist and fascism!

@Amylynne I thought it was because they rubbed their wood together.

Ergo a "bundle" of "wood"

@Amylynne Still...nice research shizzle.





I'm never using shizzle unironically ever again.

@Fangirlsarah1996 gales of laughter!you said wood! Huh huhuuh

@Fangirlsarah1996 I got a good laugh out of that. 😂

@Amylynne @UndeadPrivateer I'm unsure if I should thank you or feel ashamed...or both...

@Fangirlsarah1996 Oh both! One of each?

@Amylynne So many changes as languages evolve over time. For all we know it might have been an acronym. F**k A Guy. F.A.G