bog [ME] In Gaelic bog means ‘soft’, and this is the source of our word. In the slang sense ‘toilet’, bog [M18th] was originally bog-house, which is recorded as early as 1664. The British Labour Party spin doctor Alastair Campbell caused widespread offence in 2001 when he said that ‘The day of the bog-standard comprehensive school is over’. Bog-standard is first recorded in print as recently as 1962, although people working in the British motor industry remember it being used a little before this. It may be a reference to bog in the sense ‘lavatory’, but it is more likely to be an alteration of box standard, meaning ‘made in a standard form and packaged in a box, made from standard parts’ [1980s]. Although recorded later, ‘box standard’ was probably in earlier use in motor manufacturing.