hackneyed

 I put the word "hackneyed" on my long backlist of words to look into in April 2021, so it seems high time to bring it out of the dusty corner where it's been lingering. I don't remember why it sprang out to me at the time, and I don't know why I've picked it as the one with which to renew investigations here now.

I know what "hackneyed" means, or at least think I do. It means worn-out, trite, commonplace. Unoriginal.Passé. But where does it come from? Does it have any relationship to hackney cabs, and if so, what could that possibly be?

Well, we must start off with a controversy.  According to the website World Wide Words, the editors of the first edition of the Oxford English Dictionary were quite sure that the word "hackney" derived from the French  haquenée, which meant and still means "an ambling horse." However, modern writers are just as certain that the French actually derives from an English placename, namely Hackney, England. 

Hackney Downs

A hakeney (Middle English) was a horse raised for riding --or ambling-- as opposed to being raised as  a warhorse or those used for hunting and racing. (You can see why these perfectly fine animals might seem a little, well, commonplace by comparison.) The countryside around Hackney was apparently ideal for raising horses (see the remnant of the landscape above) and it seems that the town of Hackney developed a nice little trade hiring out of these beasts. The 'to hire' aspect began that kind of drift that language is wont to do, so that the word expanded its meaning to include other beings who could be hired--like servants. And prostitutes. I think we can all see that any of these hired out beings might become tired out and overused. Which I'm guessing is the real link to our modern term "hackneyed."

Hackney carriage, Gibraltar Museum

With this mystery (perhaps) solved, let's move on. For the word "hackney" also kept its associations with horses. According to Wikipedia, the first private coaches were used by the aristocracy in the 1580s. It didn't take long for the general public to emulate the upper classes and the first horse powered hackney cabs and carriages came along in the 1600s.

But even as horse drawn carriages began to be replaced by motorized cabs, the term "hackney" stayed with them, even though the horses didn't. 

a modern hackney carriage

The excellent Grammarphobia blog lays out the evolution of the subsequently shortened term "hack" quite succinctly:

As for the short form “hack,” it evolved similarly. Here are the earliest OED dates for some of its senses: horse for hire (1571), driver of a hackney carriage (1661), hireling (1699), trite writing (1710), trite or dull (1759), journalistic drudge (1798), ride a horse (1800), writer of unoriginal work (1927).

Perhaps inevitably these days, the word "hack" leads us eventually to think of "hacker", and in an interesting piece at Deepgram,  essayist Morris Gevirtz shows us how the term "hack" has had two meanings since its emergence in English, one having to do with horses and one with the physical and often violent act of hacking. He argues that in our contemporary sense of hacking, the two meanings have been reunited again. 

But let's not forget the horses! For the Hackney is also a recognized breed. You can see their distinctive high stepping trot in the photo below. They are often used in harness events. Read all about them in this Wikipedia article.

a Hackney in a driving competion

Well, we've come a long way from Hackney, and even Hackney itself has come a long way from the quiet village where horses once roamed the fields outside it. It was gradually swallowed up by London, and here is an image of it in the present day:

Hackney from the Air--Thomas Nugent

But if you're feeling a little nostalgic for the old Hackney, here's a delightful rendition of "If it Wasn't for the 'Ouses in Between" on YouTube. Wait for it--you'll find a mention of "Ackney Marshes" part way through. 

.