Word Origins

 

*JOLLY ROGER

The earliest of pirates' flags displayed were no more likely than a plain black sheet. Later, commercial artists pirated designs of grinning skull and crossbones in white, and by the mid-nineteenth century, such was the general appearance. To the English, about the middle of the eighteenth century, the black flag of pirates became known as a Roger, eventually a Jolly Roger. No writer of the period gives a reason for such designation. Roger, perhaps then pronounced with a hard “g” among members of the underworld—the "canting crew," as they were called—had long been a term applied to a beggar or “rogue.” Jolly, of course, meant "carefree." It would follow, therefore, that the Jolly Roger would represent the flag of carefree rogues.

A jolly Roger Miller, above, talented Nashville singer, songwriter, musician, and actor, is not the same thing. 

*Inspired by Charles Funk (1881–1957)