Axe

Filed Under April 2007, columns 

Not, to put it mildly, fair.

Dear Word Detective: Having recently stumbled into a situation in which I am supposed to become the lead guitarist for a very good and already-existing band in approximately a week despite the fact that I don’t even know how to hold a guitar correctly, I naturally find myself wondering about the etymology of the term “axe” as used to denote a guitar. The lead vocalist erroneously informs me that the term came into use as a result of the axe-shaped instrument of the bassist for KISS, but this is patently nonsensical — “axe” to describe an instrument predates KISS. (Am I supposed to be capitalizing that?) I’ve poked around, but I’m coming up with nothing. So, seeing as how I should really be devoting my time to figuring out how to play what is apparently to be my instrument now, I thought I would turn my query over to someone who has considerably more expertise in ferreting out these matters anyway. Thanks very much. Now, off to try to figure out what exactly those string thingies are supposed to do. — Vivian.

Good going. You realize, of course, that you have just ruined the day, and possibly the life, of every aspiring rock guitarist who reads this column. Suburban garages from Des Moines to Damascus and New Delhi are, this very moment, echoing to the sound of Fenders smashing on concrete, and I predict that law schools will see an unprecedented spurt in applications next month. On the other hand, if your letter has discouraged even just one budding Eagles tribute band, you’re a candidate for sainthood in my book.

Kiss, of course, is a dinosaur-rock band beloved by twelve-year olds, and the band name is not normally capitalized (except by their fans, who capitalize pretty much everything they type). The root of “axe” in the literal sense of “tool for chopping” is the Old English “aex,” from a Germanic root with descendants in several other languages. The variant spelling “ax” was the more popular until the 19th century, but “axe” now seems more popular. Since few of us still chop our own firewood, the most common use of “axe” today is probably in the phrase “to get the axe” meaning “to be fired or dismissed,” in allusion to the effects of the executioner’s axe in pre-cubicle days.

The use of “axe” as slang for a musical instrument dates back to 1955, i.e., in the edenic pre-Kiss days. The instrument to which “axe” was first applied, however, was not the guitar, but the saxophone. The logic may have been simply the “sax/axe” rhyme, but another theory ties “axe” to the “swing” of a jazz sax player in full stride. “Axe” was also later applied to the trumpet before becoming accepted as slang for the guitar, a use which has probably persisted in part because of the instrument’s resemblance to an actual axe.

 

 

Comments

One Response to “Axe”

  1. Karen on December 7th, 2007 2:10 am

    I just spent the evening watching first, a PBS airing of Eric Clapton’s 2007 Crossroads concert, during which I idly wondered about the use of the term axe for guitars. Then, the same station aired tape of Bob Dylan at Newport in 1963, 1964 and 1965. At the 1965 concert someone clearly says, “He’s getting his axe … he needs an acoustic guitar.” Not a print form, but clear usage well in advance of the Wikianswers suggestion that it originated with Jimi Hendrix at Monterrey.

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