Toff

Contrary to popular wisdom, toff, which is British informal for an upper class, wealthy person does not derive from toffee nosed. In fact, it is the other way round, toffee-nosed derives from toff. Toff dates from the mid-19th century and derives from the tufts or tassels worn by upper class academics, similar to the tufts or tassels on university mortarboard hats. Upper class people were first called ‘tufts’ which eventually evolved to toffs by the mid-19th century. Toffee-nosed describing a pretentious, stuck up person is in fact a later development and dates from the 1920s. Strictly speaking, it should be spelt ‘toffy’ nosed because it derives from toff. This would avoid the misleading connection to toffee as in confectionery.