The OED has quotations back to 1867 for the sense "serve drinks"; in the more general sense "act as butler" it quotes Mrs Humphrey Ward from 1918 (The under~housemaid ‘buttles’ for him like a lamb.), and in the same year Wodehouse for the gerundial noun (How on earth did you come to be here? What's the idea? Why the buttling?).
Which reminds me of the classic short story/Twilight Zone ep, "To Serve Man" - in case you don't know it, the entire premise of the episode is based on a pun on the title.
According to the pompous Kenneth G. Wilson (The Columbia Guide to Standard American English), buttle (v.) "is a back-formation from butler (past tense and past participle are buttled) describing what this functionary does: at best it is Conversational and Informal; at worst it is slang."
I beg to differ, sir - it is hilarious and adorable.
The OED has quotations back to 1867 for the sense "serve drinks"; in the more general sense "act as butler" it quotes Mrs Humphrey Ward from 1918 (The under~housemaid ‘buttles’ for him like a lamb.), and in the same year Wodehouse for the gerundial noun (How on earth did you come to be here? What's the idea? Why the buttling?).
Which reminds me of the classic short story/Twilight Zone ep, "To Serve Man" - in case you don't know it, the entire premise of the episode is based on a pun on the title.
I suppose it should be described as "to serve" or something horribly boring like that.
However else does one describe what a butler does?
According to the pompous Kenneth G. Wilson (The Columbia Guide to Standard American English), buttle (v.) "is a back-formation from butler (past tense and past participle are buttled) describing what this functionary does: at best it is Conversational and Informal; at worst it is slang."
I beg to differ, sir - it is hilarious and adorable.
I think Wodehouse invented this - backformation from butler.