This week’s word is all about personality. Thanks are due to one of the sassiest people I know, Arla Shephard, for inspiring this particular etymology.

To be sassy is to act in a lively, spirited, self-assured, provocative or generally “cheeky” manner. It can also mean to act rudely or disrespectfully. The word is actually a variation on the adjective saucy, which comes from sauce, which, in turn, comes from the Old French word sausse, related to the Provençal, Spanish, Portuguese and Italian word salsa.

This comes from the Latin word of the same spelling, and thence from the Latin salsus, meaning “salted,” and referring to an “appetizing accompaniment” or condiment meant to supplement an article of food, according to the Oxford English Dictionary. Interestingly enough, it has the same etymological root as salad.

So one could say that to be sassy is to act as a sort of “social sauce” in human interactions.

The earlier, related form of sassy, saucy, first showed up in written English in about 1530 with a good early example coming in 1548, in Nicholas Udall’s The first tome or volume of the paraphrase of Erasmus upon the Newe Testament, with the line, “What a more shamelesse or sawcie pranke coulde there bee, then to take downe the tyling of an other mannes house, and to toumble in such a lothely syght before such a presence to behold it?” (sic). Udall was an influential translator, schoolmaster and playwright, principally known for writing some of the standard Latin textbooks of the era and inspiring generations of English teachers.

The first appearance of sassiness in modern English came in 1815, in David Humphreys’ The Yankey in England, with the line, “‘Ah, you sly boots. Don’t be saucy.’ ‘Saisy!’” Humphreys was a literal Connecticut Yankee and hero of the American War of Independence, having served as an aide-de-camp to Gen. Washington. After the war, he was appointed as a diplomat and secret agent for the new nation, eventually retiring to life as a patriotic, sheep-searing country gentleman.

He also dabbled in poetry and romantic comedy of so-so quality, producing one comedy, the above-mentioned Yankey in England, toward the end of his life. Set in a London hotel, the play involves the silly adventures of expatriate Americans and a French nobleman.

Mark Twain would later describe himself as sassy in 1870, with the line, “And then I talked sassy to him for a page or two,” in Letters to his publishers, 1867–1894. Sir Pelham Grenville “P.G.” Wodehouse (of Jeeves and Wooster fame) used the word in this line from Laughing Gas in 1936: “Have you ever had to look after a sassy, swollen-headed, wisecracking child star?”

I encourage you all to show a little sass this week as we trudge toward the end of the quarter together. So saucily sass it up, and feel free to also submit your word suggestions. Until next time, cheers.

[Reach columnist Will Mari at features@thedaily.washington.edu.]