mugshots

[xmanfe1999]

Hi! Can someone tell me what the origin of the word "mugshot" is ? I know what they are, but I really don't understand the word. Has it got something to do with mugs (meaning these tall cups English and American people use to drink their tea or coffee?) (is it a slang word for someone with a srange or ugly face?). Help me, I'm French ...

[shaneystar]

A photograph of a person's face.Normally used when a photo is taken for police records.
Mug is a slang word for face in english and a shot ..a photograph.

[xmanfe1999]

Thanks but I said I knew what mugshots were (shot as in snapshot...), and I suspected mug meant face, but why? I insist, has it something to do with a mug (a cup?). Is it an old (from the origins of police identification) word or a more recent (second half of the 20th century) one? Thanks anyway...

[shaneystar]

Mug is also rhyming slang. Toby Jug....mug.
it also means ..a foolish person.
A Toby Jug is a type of drinking vessel .
According to Chambers dictionary the word mug
is a cup with more or less vertical sides.The word coming possibly from the scandanvian mugga.
Also ..the face..the mouth....possibly from the grotesque face on a drinking mug. ie...the Toby Jug.

[Ouisch]

You were right in thinking it was related to the drinking cups called "mugs."  In the 18th century, many of those cups were decorated with grotesque faces, and eventually "mug" became synonymous with an unattractive face (i.e. "he's got a mug only a mother could love").  Eventually, mug just came to be slang for *any* face.

[xmanfe1999]

thank you so much shaneystar and Ouisch.