maggot

Meanings

A soft, legless larva of a fly or other dipterous insect, that often eats decomposing organic matter.
A worthless person.
A whimsy or fancy.
A fan of the American metal band Slipknot.

From Middle English magot, magotte, probably Anglo-Norman metathetic alteration of maddock, originally a diminutive form of a base represented by Old English maþa (Scots mathe), from Frankish *maþō, from common Proto-Germanic *maþô, from the Proto-Indo-European root *mat, which was used in insect names, equivalent to made + -ock. Near-cognates include Dutch made, German Made and Swedish mask.
The use of maggot to mean a fanciful or whimsical thing derives from the folk belief that a whimsical or crotchety person had maggots in their brain.

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