What is the ut?
Somebody — Statesman columnist Ken Herman to be precise — asked me that last week. At least he was pretty sure about the rut itself and asked the derivation of “rut.” I was embarrassed to say I really couldn’t answer. For the truly sheltered, the rut is the mating period, when animals are involved in trying to further their own species. It’s strictly mammals, I said, and speculated that the source may be German, from where much of our hunting language comes. Birds don’t rut. And we don’t describe humans in that way. Here’s the official definition of rut: “1) An annually recurring condition or period of sexual excitement and reproductive activity in male deer; 2) a condition or period of mammalian sexual activity such as estrus.” There is no German component here, unless you count the Middle English word “rutte.” There’s also “rut” from Old French; Vulgar Latin’s “rugitus,” which derives from “rugere” (which means to roar, and that comes down from Latin “rug ire,” also meaning to roar.
