discombobulate v.

"confound, confuse," 1852, a fantastical mock-Latin American English coinage from confound or confuse, originally in "Negro dialect" passages in works such as "J. Thornton Randolph's" pro-slavery "The Cabin and Parlor" (1852, a response to "Uncle Tom's Cabin"), picked up in London publications by the 1860s. Similar formations include confubuscate, conflabberated, etc., and compare discombobulate. Related: Confusticated; confusticating.

"run away, make off," 1840, earlier absquotilate (1837), "Facetious U.S. coinage" [Weekley], perhaps based on a mock-Latin negation of squat (v.) "to settle." Said to have been used on the London stage in in the lines of rough, bragging, comical American character "Nimrod Wildfire" in the play "The Kentuckian" as re-written by British author William B. Bernard, perhaps it was in James K. Paulding's American original, "The Lion of the West." Civil War slang established skedaddle in its place. Related: Absquatulated; absquatulating; absquatulation.

1834 (as discombobracated); see discombobulate.