Q&A
Why do we say ‘goodbye’?
• SHORT ANSWER
It has morphed from the original 16th-century parting phrase
• LONG ANSWER
With so many variants of goodbye, from ‘farewell’ to ‘see you later, alligator’, the word today seems to be regarded with a certain formality, even finality. Yet it was initially imbued with religious significance when leaving someone’s company. It comes from ‘godbwye’, which is itself a shortened way of saying, ‘God be with you’. According to records, it started to be widely used around the 1570s, with the first known mention being this comment by English writer Gabriel Harvey, who wrote in 1573: “To requite your gallonde of godbwyes, I regive you a pottle of howdyes.” Ok, that’s done. Goodbye then.