† goodyearn.

Etymology: < good adj. + year n., perhaps after early modern Dutch †goet iaer, †goedtjaer (1569 in the source translated in quot. 1579 at sense b), found in similar use in exclamations and imprecations, chiefly in wat goedtjaer? Compare similar expletive use in early modern German jemand ein gutes jahr haben lassen ‘to wish evil on a person’ (literally ‘to let someone have a good year’), das dich ein gut jar annkum! ‘the devil take you!’ (literally ‘may you have a good year’), and similar phrases (all 16th cent.). Compare also German regional (Low German: Pomerania) wat to'm goden Jaar?, expressing dismay or annoyance (19th cent. or earlier).Notes on forms. In his 1744 edition of Shakespeare, Thomas Hanmer suggested that goodyear , goodyears (as e.g. in quots. 1600, a1616 at sense a), had the sense of ‘the French disease’, i.e. pox (pox n. 1b) or syphilis, analysed the word as an alteration of a French noun *goujeres ‘a person infected with syphilis’ (so that expletive uses of the present word would be parallel with those of pox n. (compare pox n. 2a)), and emended the form of the word accordingly. However, since there appears to be no evidence that the proposed etymon *goujeres existed in French, or that a sense ‘pox, syphilis’ was attested in English, this explanation is generally considered erroneous. Nevertheless, Hanmer's emendation to goujeres, goujeers appears in many editions of Shakespeare, and was adopted as the headword in Johnson (1755), and hence in many later dictionaries. Some 19th-cent. forms with medial j may perhaps reflect Hanmer's emendation, although many of them, like the regional forms with medial -dg- or -dj-, probably show development of the cluster /dj/ to an affricate /dʒ/. Solid, two-word, and hyphenated spellings are all found in English. Evidence in names. Earlier currency of this compound is perhaps implied by use of Godyer and variants as a ship name in the Middle English period (as e.g. Navis..que vocatur Godyer (1230), Cog Godyer (1297), La Godeyer (1316), etc.), apparently a kind of valedictory name wishing good fortune on the vessel, i.e. ‘may you have a good year’ (compare with similar motivation the ship names Cumweltohous (1466), Smotheweder, etc.). Compare also the Middle English surnames Godyer, Godeyer, etc., recorded from the late 13th cent., although the motivation for application to individuals is less clear.