botch

Meanings

1. 1
   verb

   to spoil through clumsiness; a bungled piece of work

   He managed to botch the simple repair.

Simplified etymology

Botch first appeared in late Middle English meaning simply “to repair,” without suggesting poor workmanship. By the early 17th century it had acquired its modern negative sense of repairing or performing something clumsily; its ultimate origin is unknown.

From Middle English bocchen ('to repair, patch'), of uncertain origin; the sense shifted from 'patch clumsily' to 'spoil through clumsiness'.

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