The Etymologicon: A Circular Stroll through the Hidden Connections of the English Language

Turning Trix

Meretricious is an odd little word that lots of people get wrong. It sounds a little like merit and, as merit is a good thing, you would take a guess that meretricious means, well, meritable.

It doesn’t. Meretricious means showy, gaudy and contemptible. However, the meret in meretricious is the same Latin root that you find in merit. The only difference is that it’s women who are doing the meriting.

When the Romans wanted to point out that somebody was female, they would put a trix on the end on the word. It’s a habit that has largely died out, but you still find it occasionally. A female aviator is sometimes an aviatrix, a female editor can be an editrix, and a lady who is paid to dominate men is a dominatrix.

There used to be more trixes – a tonstrix was a female hairdresser – but they slowly died out. Back in ancient Rome, though, they didn’t like women having jobs at all. In fact, almost the only women who had jobs in Rome were the women who stood in front of brothels looking for customers. The Latin for standing in front of things is pro-stitutio.

It was a way of earning a living, almost the only one for a girl, and the Latin for earning was merere. When a man earned a living he merited it, and became meritable. A veteran soldier who had retired to spend his money could proudly call himself emeritus, meaning that he had earned all he needed and retired, which is where we get Emeritus Professors.

That’s because a soldier was a man. But when a girl earned a living she was a meretrix, and meretrix could mean only one thing: tart. And that’s why meretricious still means tarty.