Hello,
There’s an avid reader of “Vogue” in my house (not me), so the word caught my eye when recently its roots were disputed and nearly landed before the courts.
The word vogue arrived in English in the late 1500s as something being the accepted fashion or the height of popularity. It was a direct borrowing from French where it had the same meaning, and a second one – the swaying motion of a boat – because in Old French the verb voguer meant to row, sway, or sail. The French may have borrowed in their own turn from German verb wagon (to float or to balance oneself) and ultimately the Proto Indo European root word wegh (to go, to move).
Apparently there’s a French expression vogue la galère (row the galley) which urges us to keep on no matter what happens.
Other languages have similar words and expressions from the same Germanic source. Italian has voga (a rowing) and Spanish has boga (rowing) but also used for fashion.
It’s not entirely clear how vogue moved from moving on the water to sweeping down a catwalk but it predates the famous magazine of the same name by centuries. In vogue meant to have a prominent place in fashion since the 1600s but the magazine was first published in 1892. It wasn’t until 1990 that Madonna released her song “Vogue” and popularised voguing dance moves thanks to the iconic video for her song. She didn’t invent the moves, however. They emerged in the late 1980s as an evolution of the 1960s Harlem ballroom scene.
Vogue has another, and older, history entirely and this is where we reach the realms of legal threats and then apologies.
As a famous brand, “Vogue” keeps an eye on enterprises using similar names. Their lawyers leaped into action in 2022 when they noticed the Star Inn Vogue being registered at Companies House in the U.K. (where you register limited companies). Unfortunately they didn’t do enough research before getting upset.
The Star Inn is a pub in the village of Vogue in Cornwall and had no intention of encroaching on the fashion sector. They also believe they have first British claim to the name – no matter what magazines or Madonna might say.
Vogue is a small village and has held the name since medieval times. The name Vogue in this case isn’t English at all, it’s Cornish, and it means a smelting house or furnace (vogue means fog in Cornish – like the smoke and fumes from such a building) which makes sense as the village was the location of mining activities for hundreds of years.
All this was pointed out in good humour by the owners of the 200 year old inn to the multinational publishers and both sides are happy there’s no risk of confusion between their respective businesses now.
Until next time happy reading, writing, and wordfooling,
Grace (@Wordfoolery)
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