(NEXSTAR) — Faux you by chance knock your drink over. What would you say occurred to it? For those who’re from Texas, or simply from the south total, you would possibly say it “tumped” over.
Normally, the phrase is used when one thing falls over, spills over, or is knocked over. You’ll be able to tump somebody over or be tumped over by another person. It’s a helpful phrase — however is it even a phrase?
And furthermore, why do Texans say this?
Whereas “tump” isn’t solely present in Texas, you’ll positively hear it there. A number of Texas information retailers have tried to hint the phrase’s origin, together with Texas Month-to-month, which pointed to a now-26-year-old publish on a message board known as Phrase Wizard (the web site is now gone, sadly). In response to Texas Month-to-month’s John Nova Lomax, that lost-to-time publish defined that “tump” was a phrase meant to imitate the “thump” of one thing falling and hitting the bottom.
A typical etymological principle is that the phrase is a mix of the phrases “tipped” and “dumped” — each of that are incessantly adopted by the phrase “over,” as “tumped” usually is. In different phrases, what’s often known as a portmanteau, as defined by Texas Normal in 2017.
Once more, the verbal phenomenon isn’t signature to solely Texas. Many southern retailers, together with Oklahoma’s The Oklahoman and Alabama’s AL.com, have famous the pattern. However, Texans on-line seem to proudly personal the phrase.
“For those who used the phrase ‘tumped’ you’re: A) from Texas B) not from Texas and probably simply had a stroke. See a physician ASAP,” joked the favored Texas Humor Twitter account in 2014.
Musings on the phrase could be seen in reference to Texas Reddit, together with this large thread of Texas slang phrases.
In a 2020 Reddit thread, one new Texan requested how lengthy till they may convincingly say “Yeehaw,” to which somebody posed a counter-challenge: “The true check is when you’ll be able to correctly use ‘tumped over’ in a sentence.”
We could by no means know the place tump got here from. What’s extra, researching tump could be harder than it was since a sure former president’s final title takes up appreciable search engine actual property now.
Lastly, if anybody ever laughs at you for utilizing tump, simply know this: the phrase’s even made it into the Merriam-Webster Dictionary. So tump away, Texas!
