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From: arnold@ucsfcgl.UUCP (Ken Arnold%CGL)
Newsgroups: net.nlang
Subject: Re: Brand New
Message-ID: <502@ucsfcgl.UUCP>
Date: Fri, 17-May-85 01:18:23 EDT
Article-I.D.: ucsfcgl.502
Posted: Fri May 17 01:18:23 1985
Date-Received: Fri, 24-May-85 21:39:24 EDT
References: <14800002@ism70.UUCP> <394@bu-cs.UUCP>
Reply-To: arnold@ucsfcgl.UUCP (PUT YOUR NAME HERE)
Organization: UCSF Computer Graphics Lab
Lines: 14

In article <394@bu-cs.UUCP> ccc@bu-cs.UUCP (Cameron Carson) writes:
>[re: origin of "brand spanking new"]
>
>I assumed the 'spanking' part to be derived from a newborn
>infant's introduction to the cold cruel world.

The addition of a middle word, even in the middle of a word, to add
emphasis is quite common in English and many other languages.  The
phrase that pops to mind is "big f-cking deal", and most of us (at
least most of me :->) have heard someone say something like
"out-f-cking-rageous!".  This is not incompatible with your etymology,
which sounds as reasonable to me as anything I could think of.

		Ken Arnold