Mrs Miggins

English

WOTD – 13 June 2025

Alternative forms

• Mrs. Miggins

Etymology

From Mrs + Miggins (“a surname”), possibly popularized by the character Mrs Miggins who is mentioned in the British television comedy series Blackadder II (first broadcast 9 January – 20 February 1986) as the owner of a pie shop, and appears in Blackadder the Third (17 September – 22 October 1987) as a coffee shop proprietress.

Pronunciation

• (Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /ˌmɪsɪz ˈmɪɡɪnz/, /-səz-/

• Audio (Southern England):

  (file)

• (General American) IPA^(key): /ˌmɪsɪz ˈmɪɡɪnz/, /-sɪs-/
• Rhymes: -ɪɡɪnz
• Hyphenation: Mrs Mig‧gins

Proper noun

Mrs Miggins

1. (UK, informal) Any ordinary woman, especially an older woman.

   I doubt that Mrs Miggins on the number 32 bus cares much about the plight of the yellow woodlouse.

   • 1849 February, “The ‘Moral Suasion’ Theory”, in The University Magazine, volume I, number 2, Charlottesville, Va.: University of Virginia, →OCLC, pages 53–54:

     Many were the high expectations entertained by fond parents, of the rapid progress which their darlings would make, when placed under the tuition of the young man from college, that would teach without whipping, "Old man," said Mrs. Miggins (as I heard) to her husband, a sturdy farmer, "old man, our Jack is a mighty smart boy: I saw him the other day, when he wanted some cake go to the cupboard, take a long stick, pull it down on the floor, and then taking it up, he ran to me and cried out, 'Goodness, mother, look here what a piece of cake I found on the floor; may'nt I have it?' He is a mighty clever boy, and neighbor Johnson's son will teach him every thing that's smart."

   • 1873, Iota [pseudonym; John Francis Waller], “Hatchley Colne”, in The Adventures of a Protestant in Search of a Religion, London: R. Washbourne, […], →OCLC, page 192:

     You can do nothing Evangelical without a tea-meeting. […] Mrs. Griggs and Mrs. Miggins are ready with their donation to your subscription list, but you must give them the opportunity of drinking Bohea in public before they will disburse.

   • 2003, Nigel Stanley, “Scalability and Security”, in Microsoft .NET Jumpstart for Systems Administrators and Developers, Burlington, Mass.: Digital Press, Elsevier Science, →ISBN, page 150:

     It's all very well trusting users, but what happens if Mrs. Miggins brings in a floppy disk from home with some code on it written by her son.

   • 2007 June 4, Mark Lynas, “Don’t Blame Mrs Miggins”, in New Statesman‎^[1], London: New Statesman Ltd., →ISSN, →OCLC, archived from the original on 2011-01-03:

     Instead, this government seems to see a Britain stymied by local vested interests, where our whole economic future is called into question because Mrs Miggins doesn't want a motorway through her back garden, or a nuclear power station built next door. […] Its solution is to cut Mrs Miggins – and anyone else who wants a say in what happens in their local neighbourhood – out of the process. Instead, big decisions will be taken by an appointed panel of "experts".

   • 2010, Adam Boulton, Joey Jones, “Decision Time”, in Hung Together: The Cameron–Clegg Coalition, London: Simon & Schuster UK, published 2012, →ISBN, part I (Campaign), page 80:

     For a mercifully short period, it felt as though the Today programme was dominated by high-level political debate over whether Labour could be blamed for the whole thing (in general, government spokesmen were not persuaded by this thesis), or whether Gordon Brown could take credit for Mr and Mrs Miggins and the Miggins brood getting home in one piece (the direction of this debate was not unpredictable either).

   • 2011 March 15, Public Administration Select Committee, House of Commons, quoting Martin Rice, witness, Government and IT—“a Recipe for Rip Offs”: Time for a New Approach: Twelfth Report of Session 2010–12 (HC 715-II), volumes II (Oral and Written Evidence), London: The Stationery Office, published 28 July 2011, →ISBN, page Ev 26, column 1:

     If Tesco want to invest and produce a front-end to interact and deal with Mrs Miggins and her interaction with Government, why shouldn't they be able to? Tesco don't want to get involved in a £1 billion procurement, but they want more up-sell to Mrs Miggins.

   • 2017 July 7, Jeremy Clarkson, “Volvo going electric will have the same effect as Mrs Miggins turning down the heating in her front room”, in The Sun‎^[2], London: News Group Newspapers, →ISSN, →OCLC, archived from the original on 2020-11-20:

     […] Volvo is a motoring minnow. They made around 450,000 cars last year. […] So Volvo announcing that it's going all electric is going to have the same effect on the world's carbon emissions as Mrs Miggins turning the thermostat down in her front room.

   • 2018, Lucian Camp, Anthony Thomson, No Small Change: Why Financial Services Needs a New Kind of Marketing‎^[3], Chichester, West Sussex: John Wiley & Sons, →ISBN:

     Although asset managers ultimately manage money for private individuals – a point which they frequently shorthand by referring to the end investor under the patronising and arrogant generic term ‘Mrs Miggins’ – very few people working in the firms have had any contact with private individuals at all. […] [E]ven in the retail market the very large majority of relationships with end clients are mediated – it isn’t actually necessary to meet Mrs Miggins, Mr Miggins or any other members of the Miggins family.

   • 2022, Darren Moor, “Try Not to Frighten Mrs. Miggins Any More than You have Already”, in How to Survive Your Early Years as a Police Officer: Tips, Tactics and Humour for the Probationer and Beyond, Market Harborough, Leicestershire: Matador, →ISBN:

     From the moment you park up in a police car outside some little old lady's house, even if it's only to walk down the road to make an inquiry at a neighbour's, Mrs. Miggins will be convinced that you're there to tell her that one of her family has died in some tragic accident.

Translations

any ordinary woman, especially an older woman

• Finnish: Pihtiputaan mummo (fi)
• Galician: please add this translation if you can