After watching the movie The Hateful Eight, I was intrigued by the name of the rest stop, Minnie’s Haberdashery. A haberdashery is a place that sells the goods of a haberdasher, who deals in small items. The term dates back to the 1300s and was initially associated with the sale of hats and purses. While believed to have Norse origins, etymologists have not found connections to Scandinavian languages. The prevailing theory suggests that haberdasher comes from the Anglo-Norman word habertas, meaning “small goods,” although its exact origin remains unknown. In the seventeenth century, haberdash briefly became a verb as a back-formation of haberdasher. Over time, all forms of the word have seen a decline in usage.
