[…] Són nou humans i amb el castor deu en total, però hi ha qui diu que són vuit humans. L’argument per comptar-ne vuit i no nou és que potser Carroll assimilava el Bonnets and Hoods amb el Boots, com si aquesta darrera fos una paraula-maleta. Hi ha qui defensa a mort aquesta interpretació.[…]
Claudi Mans i Teixidó, MONUMENTAL SNARK DE LÓPEZ GUIX, 2026-04-22
[…] There are nine humans and with the Beaver ten in total, but some say that there are eight humans. The argument for counting eight and not nine is that perhaps Carroll assimilated the Bonnets and Hoods with the Boots, as if the latter were a suitcase-word
[portmanteau] . Some defend this interpretation to the death.[…]
The discussion whether there are 8 instead of 9 Snark hunters (or 9 instead of 10 Snark hunters, if you include the talking Beaver) certainly addresses more points than just the portmanteau argument; e.g., among other points, the fact that Henry Holiday only drew 9 Snark hunters (including the Beaver again).
To keep things simple, let’s focus on the portmanteau issue. It doesn’t threaten your life to claim that that Boots might stand for bootblack, and also undeniably is a portmanteau for Bonnets+Hoods: If you cannot verify that yourself, run $ an -w -m 5 "bonnets hoods" | grep "^b" | grep -v "'" | sort under BSD or Linux etc., and you’ll see that boots is among the generated portmanteaus, which all are, like boots, meaningful English words.
Thus, the question is not whether Boots is a portmanteau or not. The question rather is whether Carroll intended to use Boots as a portmanteau and short-name (beginning with “B” like the names of the other Snark hunters) for maker of Bonnets and Hoods.
A further question is whether the lines 9 and 10 are intentionally ambiguous. Is there a Boots who is a maker of Bonnets and Hoods, or are the Boots and the maker of Bonnets two different characters?
I suggest that Carroll left it to the readers to choose between 9 or 10 Snark hunters. Both is possible, which keeps the debate alive. My personal choice (and it’s just a choice) is 9.
If Carroll used Boots as a portmanteau intentionally, did he even want us to understand that? At least it seems that he wanted to give us a hint by dedicating quite a few lines in the preface of The Hunting of the Snark to explain how to build a portmanteau, «but what we don’t expect is that he would do it it such a subtle manner, because most authors like to let the reader in on the secret at some stage. Sadly for the reader Carrol is not most authors! He is a logician with a fine and personal sense of humour. To Carroll, the longer the joke remains private, the better the joke.» (John Tufail, A Case of Mistaken Identity, 1998. Susanna Johnston reminded me of that quote on p.73 in her The Secret of the Snark, 2026.)
Lines 9 to 12 from Lewis Carroll’s The Hunting of the Snark:
«The crew was complete: it included a Boots —
A maker of Bonnets and Hoods —
A Barrister, brought to arrange their disputes —
And a Broker, to value their goods.»
Joan Gabriel López Guix’ translation (La caza del Snark, ISBN 978-8410380196, 2026-04-08):
«Completo estaba ya el equipaje: Botas;
un fabricante de Bonetes y Tocas;
Bufete, a quien llevaban para zanjar discordias;
para tasar sus bienes iba Bicoca.»
※ “Boots” is an interlaced portmanteau of “Bonnets” and “Hoods”.
※ “Botas” is an interlaced portmanteau of “Bonetes” and “Tocas”.
The translator got it right. There is a reason why Carroll gave an example for a portmanteau in the preface to The Hunting of the Snark:
※ “Rilchiam” is an interlaced portmanteau of “Richard” and “William”.
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2026-05-04, updated: 2026-05-07