Why Are Potholes Called Potholes?

Question

I was just curious how they became known as Pot Holes? I thought of this because we have so many of them in the roads here.

Answer 1

In the biography of Josiah Wedgwood, the origin of the phrase "pot hole" is explained.

In the 1700s, before mechanized digging machines, potters dug for clay by hand. In the winter, the ground froze, making it impossible to dig in the fields, so they had to dig along the lanes where carriages and horses broke down the soil, thus creating "pot holes."

Answer 2

Why Are Potholes Called Potholes

Answer 3

Why Are They Called Potholes

Answer 4

I once heard it was because back in the day people used to dig lumps of clay out of the road to make pots for there homes leaving holes behind hence the term pothole

Answer 5

Pothole (northern Britain) is also a term for a deep cave, so let's hope they don't go that deep, you would never run your car again :)

Answer 6

the fight to improve potholes is
nothing new. Our colonial forefathers were
constantly patching roads. In fact, it's
believed the first potholes date back to
Roman times, when potters dug up hunks
from the clay roads -- hence the name.

A quick check of Merriam Websters' Collegiate Dictionary, 10th Ed., suggests that the above etymology is pure folklore. According to this dictionary, the word 'pothole' dates back only to 1826 and refers to the pot-like shape of the hole.

Im sure there is a lot of Folklore and Facts out there..any one care to contribute?

Answer 7

people used to put pot in the holes

Answer 8

They start out as about the size and shape of a pot.

Answer 9

because they hold water like pots