Piggyback describes the act of riding on someone’s back and shoulders. Piggyback may be used as a noun, adjective, verb or adverb. When used as a verb, piggyback may be used figuratively to describe adding something to an existing resource, product or system. Related words are piggybacks, piggybacked, piggybacking. There is a meandering origin to the term piggyback. Originally, in the mid-1500s, the term pick-pack described carrying a bundle of goods, pack referred to the bundle of goods and pick was a dialect word that meant to place or throw. The term pick-pack evolved into the form pick-a-pack, then evolved again into the word pick-a-back. It doesn’t take much to imagine that the phrase pick-a-back sounded a lot like pick-i-back or pickyback. By the late 1700s the use of the word pick to mean to place or throw was out of date, but the term pickyback remained. The word evolved once more into the form we use today, piggyback. Note that piggyback is rendered as one, unhyphenated word.
Examples
The Congress may maintain it has not given political alliances in Uttar Pradesh a thought, as yet, but the party and its leaders are dropping enough hints to the Bahujan Samaj Party and Mayawati to show its only too keen to piggyback on the BSP bandwagon as UP Assembly elections near. (The Times of India)
There are also believed to be separate proposals that could potentially piggyback on Mr Losco’s proposal, provided they can also get 100 signatures. (The Adelaide Advertiser)
“If all they need to is piggyback off what we have then all they would really need is equipment,” said Grimes County Sheriff Chief Deputy Todd Greene. (The Navasota Examiner)
The 39-year-old was seen giving his toddler a piggyback ride while out in Sydney’s Paddington on Sunday. (The Daily Mail)