Meaning/Origin of word "Nixie"

Question

In the area of which I live, there is a certain word we use to describe somebody that is naughty, or bad, in a joking/lighthearted manner. I do not know how to spell the word, and every attempt to find it on Google led to no accurate results.

The word sounds like 'Nixee' with a hard e at the end. It might be spelled Nixy or Nixie.

We live in the middle of Pennsylvania Dutch and Amish country. The word is exceedingly common around these parts and was interested in the history.

My question is what is the history of the word 'Nixy' and is it commonplace among other parts of the United States?

Answer 1

A good-for-nothing answer

All sources I could find suggest nixie (variously spelled) comes from German, which accounts for its concentration in Pennsylvania and among or around Pennsylvania Dutch speakers. It is essentially unknown to American speakers outside that community¹.

The most detailed and plausible explanation I found, though the source is far from a linguistic reference, is The Pennsylvania Dutch Alphabet, by Chet Williamson (first published September 15th 2007 by Pelican Publishing Company).

Here’s the page that caught my eye, the entry for N:

Transcription:

ℕ is for nixnootz
A rascally child
Who gets into trouble
And runs around wild!

The Pennsylvania Dutch are very loving to their children, but you’ll often hear parents telling their little nixnootzes (or nichts-nutzes), “don’t be so nixie!”

So the theory held out here is that nixie, as a noun or adjective effectively synonymous with naughty, is a shortened form of nixnootz, derived from German nichts-nutzes, which translates to (per dict.cc):

nichts nutzen | nutzte nichts/nichts nutzte | nichts genutzt (VERB):

 jdm. nichts nutzen
to be of no benefit to sb.

 nichts nutzen
to be of no use
to be to no avail
to avail to nothing

ie, a good-for-nothing, someone whose idle hands look like ideal real estate for the Devil’s next workshop.

As I said, this is hardly a scholarly work of linguistics, but the word’s inclusion in this particular primer does suggest (a) the work is unique or particular to Pennsylvania Dutch country and (b) it would be familiar to young children of that community (I believe such books are usually targeted at children around 4-5 years old).

Nicht!

However, in search of a more scholarly source to bolster this theory, I also found some discussion of this word in an episode of the podcast A Way with Words called “Doppick and Nixie”, recorded October 20, 2010.

At the outset, a caller introduces herself as a veterinarian who moved to Selinsgrove, PA (in central PA) 20 years prior to calling (so the period she encountered the words below must have been between 1990 and 2010).

She called in to ask about a few words she’d encountered among the local population which were novel to her:

• doppick (clumsy),
• nixie (naughty), and
• dressed (in this usage meaning neutered / spayed for pets)

The host says of nixie (timestamp about 2:53 to 3:33 in the audio):

This is a little more of a stretch, but I’m betting this also comes from German, from the German word nicht, which means no. That’s when you have a cat or a child doing something they shouldn’t do, you say no! no! no! or nicht! nicht! nicht!. And it’s directly related to nix in English.

The host is somewhat of an expert of English and etymology (the point of the call-in show), but here he explicitly notes he’s speculating.

However, the caller did also present doppic as sourced from the same local speakers, and by most accounts this indeed a direct borrowing from German.

In any case, his theory that it derives from nicht aligns very well with the nichts-nutzes account from The Pennsylvania Dutch Alphabet given above.

Enter if you DARE

That said, the host of the podcast is still speculating in his answer (and as @Janus Bahs Jacquet points out in the comments, even taken at face value, it still demonstrates some unfamiliarity with German), so I wanted to find a more professional reference.

The go-to work for such questions is the Dictionary of American Regional English, aka DARE, which does have an entry for nixie².

Unfortunately, it is of no help in this particular case, as the glosses are only tangentially relevant:

nixie n
The young of the chipping sparrow. [...]
NEng [...]. nixie adv
Also sp nixy =nix adv
1.. nix adv [Ger nichts nothing] 1 No; definitely not! chiefly Nth See Map
Cf nit adv, nixie adv.

---

¹ _{This statement is anecdotal based on my experience as a native speaker of AmE (NYC based), as well as the comments of others in this and similar topics around the web, and the fact that I had to search hard to find sites which even discussed this word, let alone give an account of its origins.}

_{On top of that, none of the several dictionaries I checked using OneLook listed this sense of the word. Most redirected to straight nix, and the rest listed unrelated senses (muses, water sprites, illegibly addressed mail, etc).}

_{In the name of scholarship, however, I did a search in both the Corpus of Contemporary English (COCA) and Google nGram Viewer, and both show nixie (so spelled) is virtually unused in [written] English, particularly not contemporary [written] English, and when it is, it’s used in an unrelated sense (Nixie tubes mostly, then water sprites, then a proper noun / given name Nixie).}

² _{Sadly, despite coveting it for years, I don’t have access to this work, but user @njuffa graciously provided the contents of the entry for us in the comments.}

Answer 2

I just found your question and thought I might chime in. I am Dutch from the Netherlands, this word might be a bit controversial once you find out the actual root.

A Nixie comes from Germanic/Dutch folklore, it is a female version of a so called waterspirit, aquarius or waterdevil, which would be named "Nikker" or a "Nekker" or a "Nix", female: "Nixie". They are humanlike spirits from the water that appear in medieval folklore as being night-spirits (nix) that would interact with people who strayed outside at night. Or could jumpscare children into the water in childrens stories. A Nixie would be a female Nix/Nikker, and be described similar to a mermaid with the exception that she would have long swimming legs instead of a fishtail.

Nikkers and Nixies are often described as mischievous but friendly or helpful spirits or beings, sometimes helping people lost at night to find their way back home. But in other stories are to be feared and can lure you into the water or kidnap you in the night.

Since during this time it was not uncommon for European villagers to be kidnapped by Moorish nighttime raids from the water, the two seperate occurances might have a connection to one another and both describe beings that come from the "Dark" or "Darkness" or in the night.

Etymology of the word "Nikker":

• The word "nikker" is derived from the Middle Dutch word "nicker," which in turn goes back to the Proto-Germanic 'nikwus' or 'nikwis', meaning "nix" or "water spirit."
• The term may have been influenced by the English word "n!gger," which originally had a neutral meaning and was synonymous with the Spanish word "negro." However, it later acquired a derogatory connotation.

Related Terms in Other Languages:

• In other languages ​​the creature is also referred to as 'neck' (English), 'nix' or 'nixe' (German), and 'nøkken' (Danish).

Local References and Traditions:

• In the Netherlands there are places and streets named after the nikker, such as the Nickersteeg in Delft and the Nekkersputstraat in Ghent.
• The nikker/nixie is still discussed in local legends and folklore, and some cafes recall these old stories.

Nixies being mischievous spirits, makes sense to the meaning of naughty you gave it.

Someone else mentioned the word Nixnoots which sounds like the Dutch word Niksnut / Nietsnut - which means "A good for nothing" or someone who cant do anything - this has a different basis entirely. It come the word Niets (Nothing) and Nut (useful) or (Nichts and Nutz in German.) As in "voor niets- nuttig" (good for nothing).

If Nixie would come from Niksnut then it has changed meaning, a Niksnut literally is often someone who is lazy or clumsy and doesnt add anything helpful to the situation either on purpose or on accident. I would not directly associate this with naughty, but it could be, since it could coincide with the saying "idle hands do the devils work".

Perhaps its a mixture of the two, one does not exclude the other after all.

Hope this helps.