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SWAG


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Welcome to the Forums! :D

 

SWAG means "Stuff We All Get" or something like that . . . :anitongue: It refers to the items we might start a cache out with, or trade for when we find a cache.

 

Other Geocaching terms can be found at the TNLNSL? link in my Signature. :laughing:

 

 

Thanl you so very much. anterose :lol:

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What does SWAG mean? I am new to geocaching and trying to learn all the terms. Please enlighten me.

Thank you,

Anterose

 

Swag is an OLD term. At one time it referred to ill-gotten gains such as pirate booty. Over time it came to mean any type of loot. It isn't an acronym...........

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What does SWAG mean? I am new to geocaching and trying to learn all the terms. Please enlighten me.

Thank you,

Anterose

 

Swag is an OLD term. At one time it referred to ill-gotten gains such as pirate booty. Over time it came to mean any type of loot. It isn't an acronym...........

 

Thrak is correct. The term has been around for a long time and is not an acronym for "stuff we all get", but has been commonly used in the US for some years as a term for free stuff. (e.g. "I went to the trade show and picked up some great swag"). I first heard it about 15 years ago.

 

A Google search tells us that "in 19th century British thieves' slang, swag was a thief's plunder or booty or a quantity of goods unlawfully acquired. The term appears in Grose's 1811 Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue, where one of the definitions is "any quantity of goods".

 

James Hardy Vaux, who was a convict in Australia, includes the term in the slang dictionary compiled in 1812 and published in his Memoirs in 1819: "The Swag is a term used in speaking of any booty you have lately obtained". In Australia the term swag was transferred from the quantity of goods acquired by a thief to the possessions carried by a traveller in the bush. I guess the "Jolly swagman" in the Aussie song, Waltzing Matilda is an example of the latter usage."

 

Anyway, looking at my Webster's 9th New Collegiate Dictionary, among the definitions of swag are "goods obtained illegally" and "loot". My guess is the the current meaning has evolved from the latter usage and the idea that its an acronym for "stuff we all get" is apocryphal and of recent vintage.

Edited by briansnat
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A long time ago I heard SWAG was also an acronym for Scientific Wild A** Guess.

 

...using the SWAG method we calculated the answer to how many pickled peppers Peter Piper picked.

Thanks to everyone for your answers and help... I am getting more and more excited about Geocaching every day, can't wait to get out and do more finds.

Anterose

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