GALLIMAUFRY/ɡælɪˈmɔːfrɪ/

A hotchpotch, jumble or confused medley.

This word has been around since the sixteenth century, is still in use, but isn’t particularly common today. It’s one of those terms sometimes trotted out to give a literary feel to one’s writing, or spoken in a facetious tone for a quick laugh. Its origin is uncertain, though it could have come from the French galimafree, which might have referred to a kind of sauce or stew. Support for this comes from its earliest sense in English of a ragout or hash, to which the current meaning is obviously a figurative reference. “So now,” a writer lamented in 1579, “they have made our English tongue a gallimaufry, or hodgepodge of all other speeches”.

World Wide Words is copyright © Michael Quinion, 1996–2008. All rights reserved. Contact the author if you want to reproduce this piece, but first see our advice page, which also has notes about linking. Your comments and corrections are welcome.