Does anyone here know just what "Codswallop" is?

[Pierre.Suave]

it sounds gross and disgusting whatever it is...

:P

[AlCzervik]

1. rubbish.

or bullshit.

[Raven]

2. Websters: "nonsense;talk or writing that is foolish and insincere"

[frickaline]

3. poppycock!

[Oeditpus Rex]

4. No, but

you can bet the egg money that I'm gonna start using it. :D

[Pierre.Suave]

6. Someone beat you to it

yesterday in GDP part deux.

[SOteric]

5. The stuff that comes out of the back end of a cod?

(Yes, I really do know what it means; and no, this isn't it.)

[Pierre.Suave]

7. Now that is the reply I expected from the lounge...

the rest of you are slacking.

:P

[SoxFan]

8. There was a lot of it in GDP a while back

[jobycom]

9. Ancient word, origins unknown. Maybe McCain would know. nt

[Pierre.Suave]

10. You should ask him

make sure to get it on video...

[petronius]

11. Well, a 'codpiece' is a stiff covering worn over the genitals, and to 'wallop'

means to hit, so I guess a 'codswallop' means a punch in the balls.

(Or. maybe not...)

[Bear down under]

12. The OED online gives the origin as unknown

But notes the commonly-given but rather dubious derivation from the name of a fellow called Codd who made lemonade in the 1870s (and, one guesses, was most likely a temperance advocate). It appears that "wallop" was British slang for beer, whose admirers took up denigrating soft drinks as "Codd's wallop" -- hence "codswallop" as referring to pointless or useless nonsense.

http://www.oed.com/bbcwords/codswallop-new.html

Wiktionary, however, suggests that the term may be a 19th century fishing one. "Wallop" was a slang term for a fish's roe, but unlike sturgeon's roe (caviar)for instance that of the cod was not esteemed. In any case roes are very perishable and couldn't be preserved by drying for the long voyage from the Newfoundland fishing grounds back to Europe as the cod meat itself was for many centuries. So the cod fishers usually threw it away -- hence "cod's wallop" for a bit of useless garbage, and by extension for useless, nonsenical opinions. That seems to make more sense!

http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/codswallop

on edit: "What a load of old codswallop!" or, sometimes, "what a load of old codfish", was a favourite phrase of my grandmother's -- which seems more in keeping with Wiktionary's suggestion than the connection with Mr Codd's lemonade.

[muriel_volestrangler]

13. Wow - earliest known use 1959, in a comedy programme

And that was after an appeal in a TV programme (I think I know the one they mean) for any recorded uses:

The earliest citation of the phrase in print is the script of a 1959 episode of the UK TV series 'Hancock's Half Hour'. The writers Galton and Simpson don't claim to have coined the phrase and it was in public circulation when the show was broadcast.

'A load of codswallop' sounds old and, interestingly, it is often used as 'a load of old codswallop'. We also have the plausible and appealing Hiram Codd story. Against that there's the entirely implausible notion that the phrase was in popular circulation since 1870 but somehow didn't manage to get into print until 1959. That lack of printed record is despite the fact that an appeal for early citations that was made on national TV in the UK in 2006 moved the earliest known citation back just four years to 1959.

http://www.phrases.org.uk/meanings/235250.html

[Iggo]

14. I believe it's when...

...a female with a large chestular area runs too fast and gets walloped in the face with her own cods.

Codswalloped.

(EDIT: I spel gud.)

[datasuspect]

15. palaver or balderdash

[JVS]

16. When a boy cod and a girl cod love each other very much....