Was it a first, I wondered. Yesterday The Times print edition carried the word hat-tip on page three. And in an enthusiastic description of the plans for next years diamond jubilee celebrations, no less. A 90-minute horse-filled pageant will contain ‘a series of hat-tips to various nations.’
The term hat-tip has become common on blogs, to acknowledge someone who has made a significant contribution, or someone who drew attention to something new or interesting. A vital part of netiquette.
I assumed it had come from the old fashioned habit of tipping one's hat to a lady, or a male acquaintance, in the street, a kind of informal version of a military salute, though why it should suddenly crop up in something so cutting edge as Web 2.0 was a bit of a mystery. Do young people tip their back-to-front baseball caps to each other nowadays? Or their hoods?
The Oxford English Dictionary gives us, via a quotation which appeared in the Dictionary of Occupational Terms 1921, a definition of hat tip which has nothing to do with manners but refers merely to the circular piece of stuff used to line the crown of a hat.
Hence a hat tip sizer prints a hat tip with size before gold leaf or bronze dust is applied by hat tip printer.
Hat tip sizer is one of those occupational titles which could make reading the detailed indexes to the Census Classifications of Occupations such harmless fun, but it is not quite up there with saggarmaker's bottom knocker.
Links
The Diamond Jubilee Pageant
What is a saggarmaker's bottom knocker?
Official Social Classifications in the UK
