BBC Sherlock Fan Forum - Serving Sherlockians since February 2012 / HAHA, "Moffat" is a canon villian

**Posted by Sherlock Holmes** March 26, 2012 9:33 pm

Tonight I was reading "The Resident Patient" and was highly amused to read that Moffat is the member of a bank robbing gang:

"Any news Inspector?"
"We have got the boy, sir."
"Excellent, and I have got the men."
"You have got them!" we cried all three.
"Well, at least I have got their identity. This so called Blessington is, as I expected, well known at headquarters, and so are his assailants. Their names are Biddle, Hayward, and Moffat."
"The Worthington bank gang," cried the Inspector.
"Precisely," said Holmes.

Hahaha, Moffat. He must know about it!

**Posted by kazza474** March 27, 2012 2:45 am

Well he does have shifty eyes.

**Posted by Davina** March 27, 2012 1:51 pm

And a bag of swag over his shoulder!

**Posted by Wholocked** March 28, 2012 1:16 am

Can someone please explain to me what this term "swag" is supposed to mean? In Australia, a swag generally refers to your camping gear. I can't quite figure out what this new American slang term actually refers to.

**Posted by kazza474** March 28, 2012 2:23 am

Wholocked, I understand other countries call a bag of 'loot' - you know stolen stuff & bits and pieces of junk etc "a bag of swag'.
They got it from OUR swagman stories, assuming that Aussie Swag-men carried stolen things and bric a brac in their swag that they carried over their shoulder.

I remember this from a debate I was in once , it was something about how other countries judged Australia & its people to be. It was argued that it was kind of an insult to use that term in the way they do, some of our swagmen were very honest and trustworthy people!

**Posted by Davina** March 28, 2012 5:56 am

No we didn't get it from your swagman stories, although the origin of the word is the same.
Swag refers to a thief's plunder or booty, though it has some other meanings today like free give-always. It is traceable back to a word imported into middle English from Scandinavia, swagga or sveggia which meant to sway, rock unsteadily or lurch. It evolved into that of hanging loosely or heavily, to sag. Its first use in English can be dated to 1520s. It was originally a bag of stolen clothes or the like and was English criminals slang for a quantity of stolen property in c.1839. It is not accidental in cartoons that a thief's swag is always shown in a sack. Thus and the Australian 'swag' derive from the idea of a bundle that sags or hangs down, often at the end of a stick. Swag also meant a bulgy bag in c. 1300 also of Scandinavian origin. It could also mean cheap and tawdry prizes at a fair.

**Posted by Wholocked** March 28, 2012 5:58 am

Yes I get all that but that is not how the word is currently being used. It's in song lyrics and stuff like it's a character trait or something. "He's got swag"...like it's a good thing? But I have no idea what it's supposed to mean.

**Posted by Davina** March 28, 2012 6:06 am

It may have been invented by William Shakespeare because the word swagger, of which it is a shortened form, first appears in print in A Midsummer Night's Dream in 1590. Swagger means 1. A bold and arrogant strut 2. A prideful boasting or bragging. The rocking, swaying motion of the strutting links it to the Scandinavian origin.