On the origin of "blizzard"

Question

Blizzard is probably the most used word to indicate a violent snowstorm. Despite its popularity the etymology of the term is quite unclear. Some well-known sources hint at its onomatopoeic sound as its possible origin. Can anyone offer a reliable story behind this term or just confirm its 'obscure' origin?

Blizzard: (etymonline)

• strong, sustained snowstorm," 1859, origin obscure (perhaps somehow connected with blaze (n.1)); it came into general use in the U.S. in this sense the hard winter 1880-81. OED says it probably is "more or less onomatopœic," and adds "there is nothing to indicate a French origin."

Blizzard: (Oxford University Press):

• In British rural speech, there existed a sound imitative complex blizz expressing the idea of great quickness. When the suffix -ard was added to it, the new word began to denote all kinds of things having an immediate effect on its victim, from “a gunshot” to “an intoxicating drink.”

  Most records are from American English. In 1870, in Iowa, a violent snowstorm was called a blizzard. Storms and hurricanes travel fast. Today blizzard is an established part of the vocabulary of English. What else do we not know about its history? -

Answer 1

My original response to this question is so long that I was asked to convert it into a blog post. That answer has four main sections.

The first section looks at nineteenth-century American discussions of the various slang meanings of blizzard—which include “a stunning blow,” “an unanswerable question or argument,” and “a violent and destructive snow-storm”—and their possible origin. The second section reviews analyses of blizzard by British writers between 1888 and 1921, with a particular focus on its arguable connection to Midlands dialect words such as blizzer, blizzom, and blizzy. The third section notes attempts by more-recent etymologists to identify the roots of the word (in French, German, Anglo-Saxon, or elsewhere) and to pinpoint where the snowstorm meaning of blizzard originated. On all of these points, no clear scholarly consensus emerges.

Finally, in the fourth section of my answer/blog post, I look at occurrences of blizzard in publications dated between 1834 and 1870 (the date of the first authenticated newspaper use of the word to refer to a snowstorm). Of the 34 unique instances of blizzard that I cite in that section, 12 refer to a blast or volley from one or more firearms or cannons, 8 refer to verbal blasts, 7 to a heavy or painful physical blow not involving a firearm, 3 to a literal or figurative attack that is not otherwise identified, 2 to a mild oath, 1 to a blazing fire, and 1 to a shot of liquor. Especially interesting is the emergence during the U.S. Civil War period of blizzard in the sense of a volley or fusillade of bullets, which provides a more satisfying immediate source meaning of the word lading up to the fierce snowstorm meaning than do the earlier blazing fire and stunning blow meanings.

The origin of blizzard in the sense of snowstorm remains somewhat mysterious, but the evidence of U.S. usage prior to 1870 suggests that the word had appeared in newspapers across the nation and that it had multiple active meanings as a slang term in 1870. Under the circumstances, the notion that blizzard in the sense of snowstorm may simply have been some sort of onomatopoeic invention of an Iowa newspaperman—and only coincidentally identical to the slang word blizzard as used in other contemporaneous senses—seems quite far-fetched.

Answer 2

More background on the possible German origins:

Lyon County News, 2 March 1883:

"The word blizzard was first used in Marshall, Minnesota, by an American settler, now residing in Iowa. It was in the storm of 1873, at Charles H. Whitney's Hotel, and the man was Deacon Seth Knowles, who was a settler of Lyon county near this village. The Deacon was a fine German scholar, and while discussing the terrible storm raging without, one speaker said no word could express its severity, whereupon the deacon said: "It's a Blizzard."

"So the great storm of 1873 was locally known, and with recurring storms the term spread through the state. During late years it has been generally adopted for squalls in the eastern states, which as compared with a genuine blizzard are no more than zephyrs. The deacon knew what he was talking about and adapted the term to the terrors of the storm. A German witnessing one of these overpowering storms would say: "Der Sturm commit blitzartig,' which, translated into English, would be: 'The storm comes lightning-like.'

The translation from blitzartig to blizzard is natural and easy, while no word could better describe the oncoming snow and wind storm, and certainly there is no English word to fill the bill. The newness if the term and its pronunciation led the deacon to step to the counter of the hotel and write the word for the benefit of his friends."

Answer 3

Somewhere along the line I read that "blizzard" was derived from the German "blitz," which is a sudden and drastic onslaught of something. That pretty well describes what a blizzard is.