piggyback

“piggyback”という単語の意味をご存知でしょうか？

今日は答えを先に書いてしまいますが、いわゆる「おんぶ」のことです。

「おんぶに抱っこ」の「おんぶ」です。


Social media users are praising a young delivery worker for coming to the rescue of an elderly man struggling to cross a busy street this week.

The senior had slowly been making his way through a busy intersection in Singapore when the traffic light turned green.

Thankfully, a nearby DHL driver saw that the man had only made it halfway across the road, and he immediately pulled his van over to the side of the road and rushed to the old man’s side.

At first, the driver can be seen trying to help the man use his walker – but when they failed to make much progress, the driver simply gave the older man a piggyback ride to the other side of the street.
(When Senior Has Trouble Crossing Intersection, Delivery Driver Pulls Over and Offers Him Piggyback Ride. Goodnewsnetwork.org. May 17, 2019.)


なぜ、“piggy”なのでしょうか？豚（pig）と何の関係が？と思われるでしょう。

語源をチェックしてみると、“piggyback”と“pig”には何の関係もなく、“pickaback”（これはつまり背負うことを意味していると思われます）が変化して（訛って？）生まれたものだそうです。

“Pickaback”は“piggyback”と同じ意味で使われる単語として残っていますが、元々は“pick pack”、それが“pickback”、さらに“pickaback”と変化してきたもののようです。