What did we do before google?
Who else in a the snap of a finger could tell us the history of why we call piggy banks piggy banks?
Turns out it comes from the word pygg, which (according to Wikipedia), “is an orange… clay commonly used during the Middle Ages as a cheap material for pots to store money, called pygg pots or pygg jars.”
Somewhere down the road the jars took on the shape of the animal.
I don’t remember ever having a piggy bank until a friend made me a pink one with gold wings in papier mache. I was an adult by then but I took pleasure filling the flying pink pig with coins. Then one day, I don’t know why, I gave it an appendectomy and took the contents to the bank.
I have the pig still, a gaping hole in its side (too sad to show in a pic) and still toss in loose change… but it’s so much easier now to get them out when I’m short for the pizza guy.
(Also… WHY ARE THERE SO MANY AT THE SALLY ANNE???)
Who gives away their piggy banks???
♦
Other (not always) wordless friends:
Allison Howard
Elizabeth Yeoman
Matilda Magtree 
Oh your piggy party got an instant laugh our of me. They are wonderful. Such a collection of colourful personalities!!
The CIBC one makes me a little sad. Everyone else so gay and carefree and there it is forever and ever… working while others play.
I’m not sure if I’m more fascinated by the array of piggies here or the etymology of piggy bank. So is “pygg” also the origin of the word “pig”? I know there isn’t a parallel word like “pig” in either Latin or Germanic languages (or none that I know of anyway, ha!) Anyway, delightful cheerful photo for a cold grey day in November.
From what I’ve read, I understand ‘pygg’ to have been the orange clay potters used to make containers for loose change. They were made in standard shapes initially, then various, and then in the 18th C. someone made a pig shaped container. But your question remains… is THAT where the word pig came from?… not sure, but it looks like it jolly well might have done. A big maybe in other words. (I personally cannot WAIT to be seated next to an etymologist at a dinner party so that I can whip out this very question!)
Appendectomy. Good image. Hoping that it’s anatomically correct since you never know who might be reading this…
Oh my god, I never thought… but, yes, good point. (if so, let the record show that I’m nothing but a lowly hack with a box cutter and a pair of kitchen scissors) The correct term may well be ‘porkbellyectomy’… but I defer to the wisdom and hallowed halls of learning, ie. Gimli. xo
Pigs and word origins – what a treat! Also, I’m thinking maybe you see so many in second hand stores because no one saves real money anymore?
I wondered the same thing. But, really??? Or maybe coins are the new peanuts. Gimme a twenty! But where’s the joy in that? Priceless is the pleasure of fishing out a dime and a quarter with a butter knife and heading to the store, rich and feeling dangerous.