Twat

Twat is an English-language vulgarism which means the vulva or vagina, and is used figuratively as a derogatory epithet. In British English and Irish English it is a common insult referring to an obnoxious or stupid person regardless of gender; in American English, it is rarer and usually used to insult a woman. In Britain and Ireland, the usual pronunciation rhymes with hat, while Americans most often use the older pronunciation that rhymes with squat. This is reflected in the former variant spelling of twot. The literal sense is first attested in 1656, the epithet in the 1930s. The word's etymology is uncertain. The American Heritage Dictionary suggests a conjectural Old English word thwāt, meaning 'a cut', cognate with the Old Norse þveit (thveit). Jonathon Green suggests a connection with twitchel, a dialect term for a narrow passage. The 20th-century British slang verb twat, meaning 'to hit, whack', is probably an unrelated homonym of onomatopoeic origin.