"Namby-Pamby"

       "Namby-pamby."  I employed it yesterday in the blog.  It just dropped into my head.  I found I'd made the right use of it.  But where did the word come from?

       Two 18th century English poets had manufactured and disseminated it in describing a rival poet's efforts.  Alexander Pope and his friend Henry Carey were taking off on Ambrose Philips.

       The AHD tells us Carey coined the name in poking fun at Philips's children's verse:  "So the Nurses get by Heart Namby Pamby's little Rhimes."  Carey took the "Namby" from "Ambrose,"  added the rhyming repetition starting with the "P" from Philips.  Then Pope utilized the satirical nickname in his epic The Dunciad in 1733; this popularized it, and namby-pamby went on to be used generally for anyone or anything insipid, weak, or sentimental.