Vol. 41 No. 2 (1993)
Research Article

Yahoo (Yahu): Notes on the Name of Swift's Yahoos

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  • Richard Crider
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1179/nam.1993.41.2.103

Published 1993-06-01

Copyright (c) 1993 Maney

Creative Commons License

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.

Abstract

Abstract

The name Yahu, variant of Yahweh, component of numerous names in the Hebrew Bible, including the Hebrew form of Swift's own first name, Yehonatan ‘the gift of Yahu,’ may have been Swift's source for the name Yahoo in the fourth voyage of Gulliver's Travels. Swift could have meant the echo of Yahu in Yahoo as an ironic and tragic reminder that humans, said to be created in the image of Yahweh, are capable of degenerating to the moral depths symbolized by the Yahoos.

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