Wednesday's Random Slang-o-rama: Argy-bargy (by DMcC)

 Hello all! I've enlisted some occasional help with Slang-o-rama from the euphonious DMcC (aka Devyn McConachie)—so look for entries such as this one to pop up from time to time! Now, a bit about our assistant slang-o-rama-ist:

Devyn McConachie is a designer-editor-cartoonist, currently lurking about Portland, Oregon. Were it not for her wobbly landlubber legs and love of indoor-living, she would absolutely have taken up a career as a sea-pirate. Landlocked as she is, she instead fills her days with graphic design, animation, illustration, and copy editing.

For more info and to view her visual portfolio, visit this here link. She also has an Etsy shop (arts, hats, and cards) right here. 

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Returning to an earlier theme, here’s another nearly-nautical-sounding phrase… argy-bargy! Alas, Ann had no luck with the boat-connection with “dory” in hunky-dory, but perhaps “bargy” will prove fruitful in this hunt for a boating idiom. Let’s find out… 

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According Merriam-Webster Online, an argy-bargy is a “lively discussion,” or “an argument or disagreement.” Like shilly-shally from last year, argy-bargy features rhyming reduplication—a linguistic tweak where a word or word stem is repeated for expressive effect. The stem, argy, is a Scots-English term for “argue,” with first known usage as early 1839.

The Chess Game by 19th-century painter Charles Bargue (no relation to argue-bargue, but these fellows do look ready to start an argie-bargiement)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Bargue_The_Chess_Game.jpg, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=9370799

The Scottish National Dictionary, contained in the Dictionaries of the Scots Language (Dictionars o the Scots Leid, or DSL for short), offers a similar definition—according to the DSL, argy-bargy (or argie-bargie) means:

1. (Noun) A dispute in words, a quarrel, haggling, its use generally implying impatience with the speaker. (for example: “The other [hand] gesticulating in front of Tom Reid in an argy-bargy over the amount of his charge.”)
2. (Verb) To dispute, to haggle. (for example: “Sittin' on the corner o' the table, he argy-bargied away, but a' to no purpose.”)

 The DSL defines the root word argy (or argie) as:

1. (Verb) To argue, [generally] in a contentious or noisy fashion.
2. (Noun) Assertion. 

… with the noun form appearing in text as early as 1808.

 Along with argie/argy, and argy-bargy / -bargie come a whole extended Scottish family of varying spellings and sayings, brimming with rhyming reduplications. To name a few...

• Argey-reerie: (noun) a wrangle, a scolding 
• Arg: (verb) to talk ill-temperedly and hot-headedly 
• Argie-bargiement: (noun) a wrangling, contention 
• Argifee (or argufee, argufy, arguify): (verb) to argue, to signify
• Argolling: (noun) argument, reasoning
• Argle-bargle (or argol-bargol): (noun) Contention, dispute. (verb) to dispute
• Argle-bargling: (verbal noun) disputation
• Argle-bargler: (noun) contentious person, disputer, debater
• Argle-barglous (or argol-barglous, argol-bargolous): (adjective) quarrelsome, disputatious

 The DSL notes in the entry for argle-barglous that the words argue and bargain may have been the basis for these repetitive reduplicates. To plumb the depths as far as we can...

The Online Etymology Dictionary traces the verb argue back to the 1300s, from the French arguer (“maintain an opinion or view; harry, reproach, accuse, blame”), which itself came from the Latin arguere (“make clear, make known, prove, declare, demonstrate”)... An old term indeed, no argolin’ with that!

Uh-oh, looks like someone starting an argie-baaaaahrgie
Image by suju from Pixabay

As for bargain, the same etymology dictionary cites its origin to the 1400s, based on the Old French term bargaignier (“to haggle over the price”), which itself was based on a Germanic term, likely the Proto-Germanic borgan (“to pledge, lend, borrow”). However, 19th-century German philologist Friedrich Diez suggested that the French bargaignier could, in fact, have come from the Late Latin barca—a barge!—although there aren’t many sources to back this theory.

Hmmm, a tenuous conclusion, if there is one. Personally, I’m wiffle-waffling on whether this counts as a sea term… But at this point, I’ve got to either fish or cut bait—so I’ll leave it to you to decide!

What do you think? Argy-bargy, a boat-based byword, or no?