...comes from the late Latin pundiare, to prick or punch. Pepys, in his Diary, April 30, 1669, calls punch "a word of common use for all that is thick and short." Suffolk punches are thick-set draught horses with short legs. To sum up, the four ideas that keep recurring...

...poor people there in the ally, did hear them call their fat child "punch"; which pleased me mightily, that word being become a word of common use for all that is thick and short. 3 At night home, and there find my wife hath been making herself clean against tomorrow. And late as...

...poor people there in the ally, did hear them call their fat child Punch, which pleased me mightily, that word being become a word of common use for all that is thick and short. May 1. Up betimes. My wife extraordinary fine with her flowered tabby gown that she made two years...