I read once, that there was a Music Hall act in the 19th. century where a man could “fart” on demand, & had a repertoire of tunes he could perform with his “farting” ability!!!!

That would empty the place, wouldn’t it!!!! 🙂

[Origin: 1350–1400; ME ferten, farten (v.), fert, fart (n.); c. Gk pérdein (v.), pord (n.)]

Usage history

[edit] Early usage

A well known usage of the fart in Middle English occurs in Chaucer’s “Miller’s Tale” (one of the Canterbury Tales). In the tale (which is told by a bawdy miller as a group of pilgrims travel to Canterbury), Absolon has already been tricked into kissing Alison’s bottom when he is expecting to kiss her face. Her boyfriend Nicholas hangs his buttocks out of a window, hoping to trick Absolon into kissing his **** in turn and farts in the face of his rival Absolon.[1] Absolon is humiliated by this gesture but has come equipped for revenge and sears Nicholas’s rear with a red-hot poker.The Oxford English Dictionary gives Chaucer’s usage (1386) as its earliest citation for the noun form of the word, though it provides an earlier (1250) citation for the verb form.[2]

The fart is frequently available (often through puns on the word “wind”) as a comparison for undesirable speech or writing, as in these lines from an epistle by John Wilmot, Earl of Rochester:

Fumes

And

Rumbling

Tremors