The caboodle in this American expression meaning " the whole lot" is the same as the word boodle, for "a pile of money", deriving from the Dutch boedal, " property". The whole kit, of course, means the entire outfit. The phrase doesn't read " the whole kit and boodle" because Americans like alliteration in speech and added a "k" sound before boodle in the phrase.

    Source: QPB Encyclopedia of Word and Phrase Origins By Robert Hendrickson


Please send submissions to ____ dave@unm.edu

Back to the Word Origin Page