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The origin is a hard one to answer! But, Margaret can easily become Maggie, which drops the R; Maggie or Mag becomes Meg, which is or used to be the preferred Scottish nickname form, and Peg rhymes with Meg! The same kindof thing happened with Mary, which became Molly (R is a hard sound for children, and most nicknames come from other children in the family who can't quite get their young tongues round the new sibling's real name) and then Polly. For boys, Robert to Bob is similar, I think.

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