Etymology 1

Etymology 2

Either Mash Note] at World Wide Words[http://books.google.com/books?id=j41z0yeKbeIC&pg=PA195&dq=masher The City in Slang], by Irving L. Allen, [http://books.google.com/books?id=j41z0yeKbeIC&pg=PA195&dq=masher p. 195] by analogy withThe Barnhart Concise Dictionary of Etymology, as cited at [http://www.grammarphobia.com/blog/2007/03/mash-notes.html The Grammarphobia Blog: Mash notes], March 16, 2007 . Originally used in theater,Random House Historical Dictionary of American Slang and recorded in US in 1870s. Either originally borrowed as masher, from (masha), or from . Leland writes of the etymology:Preface to poem “The Masher”, in his Songs of the Sea and Lays of the Land], [http://books.google.com/books?id=B2GmNo96450C&printsec=frontcover

PPA243,M1 p. 243] ([http://www.archive.org/stream/songsofthesea00lelarich/songsofthesea00lelarich_djvu.txt full text)

: It was introduced by the well-known gypsy family of actors, C., among whom Romany was habitually spoken. The word “masher” or “mash” means in that tongue to allure, delude, or entice. It was doubtless much aided in its popularity by its quasi-identity with the English word. But there can be no doubt as to the gypsy origin of “mash” as used on the stage. I am indebted for this information to the late well-known impresario [Albert Marshall] Palmer of New York, and I made a note of it years before the term had become at all popular.