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I bought myself a Christmas present and as there's no surprise in a present for yourself I've decided to start using it early. It's a desk calendar for 2004 called
Jeffrey Kacirk's Forgotten English : A 366 Day Calendar of Vanishing Vocabulary and Foklore. I'm intending to post the words from it here and rather than wait until January I'll start now. The days will be a little out of step until the end of the year but never mind. I'll only post the folklore sections if they are especially amusing. The word for today is deosculate which is quite appropriate to our birthday celebration for CJ meaning, as it does, kissing with eagerness. It comes from Edward Phillips's New World of English Words, 1658. Why should I let the toad work Squat on my life ? Can't I use my wit as a pitchfork And drive the brute off ? Read all about my travels around the world here. Read even more of my travel writing and poems on my weblog. |
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"It's a lesson that's best learnt when young:
"You can go kiss the bride but don't slip her the tongue!" (Wrote that when I was about 10 or 12.) And as far as kissing with eagerness is concerned, if you're doing it in any other fashion, should you even be doing it at all?? |
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quote:So, tell me, CJ, when your elderly aunt slobberily (my own coinage; BTW, I know there is a word for wet kisses, but I can't think of it.) kisses you, do you await the kiss eagerly? Thanks, Bob, for doing this because I have been missing what I call our pure word posts. |
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king's ex
A call, abbreviated of "king's excuse" used by children to stop a game for a moment. In playing "base", when a boy falls down and so keeps himself from being caught he usually says King's ex! which serves him as protection. -Sylva Clapin's Dictionary of Americanisms 1902 Americanisms, eh ? Have any of the US posters ever heard this ? The story in the folklore section today is also amusing. I'll paraphrase for brevity. George II was at the London premiere of Handel's Messiah. When the chorus sang "And he shall reign for ever and ever" he, not being perticularly strong in English (German was his first language) mistakenly thought they were referring to him and stood to take the accolades of the people. Wndering what was happening everyone else stood and this has - so it says here - led to standing becoming a custom at performances of the Messiah. It is of course folklore so probably untrue. Why should I let the toad work Squat on my life ? Can't I use my wit as a pitchfork And drive the brute off ? Read all about my travels around the world here. Read even more of my travel writing and poems on my weblog. |
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ullapse
An explanation when anything goes wrong. -Thoams Sternberg's Dialect and Folklore of Northamptonshire 1851 Why should I let the toad work Squat on my life ? Can't I use my wit as a pitchfork And drive the brute off ? Read all about my travels around the world here. Read even more of my travel writing and poems on my weblog. |
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First, Bob, I am enjoying this thread a great deal. Thanks.
No, I have never heard of "king's ex" or "king's excuse." Anyone else? I couldn't find the word "ullapse" in dictionary.com nor in Onelook. From your definition, I don't understand how you would use it. It is the explanation when something goes wrong?  |
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I'm afraid I can't clarify the usage. I'm simply quoting the calendar that I have. It is an obscure dialect word though so I'm not surprised that it isn't in dictionaries.
For example here in my region we use the word "suck" for what would in the US usually be called "candy" but I'll bet not many dictionaries list it with that meaning. Why should I let the toad work Squat on my life ? Can't I use my wit as a pitchfork And drive the brute off ? Read all about my travels around the world here. Read even more of my travel writing and poems on my weblog. |
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gelt
A lunatic, adapted from the Irish geilt, a mad or frenzied person. According to the Old Norse work Konungs Skuggsja, a gelt was one who went mad with fear in battle, and thenceforth lived in the woods like a wild beast. - Sir James Murray's New English Dixtionary, 1901 Why should I let the toad work Squat on my life ? Can't I use my wit as a pitchfork And drive the brute off ? Read all about my travels around the world here. Read even more of my travel writing and poems on my weblog. |
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What a perfect word for the Hannukah season. During Hannukah, children receive the gift of money, or Hannukah gelt.
Of course, in the U.S. that has expanded to gifts in order to compete with Christmas. [BTW, since the calendar has "forgotten English words," I am dying to hear if it has "epicaricacy!"] [This message was edited by Kalleh on Mon Dec 22nd, 2003 at 12:11.] |
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Under the heading of "gelt = money" is the old term "Ph.G" meaning a college degree a woman seeks when she is less interested in acquiring knowledge than she is in meeting (and hopefully marrying) a man with high earning potential.
It stands for "Papa has Gelt" (though I don't think I've heard this term used for some 20 years or more). |
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I like today's word even if there is very little about it on the calendar.
songewarie The interpretting of dreams. - James Halliwell's Dictionary of Archaic and Provincial Words 1855 It is a real word though because searching with Google gives this as the top hit. The relevant passage is about two thirds of the way down the page. And also for Piers þe Plowman - ful pencif in herte And which a pardon Piers hadde - al þe peple to conforte And how þe preest inpugned it - wiþ two propre wordes Ac I haue no sauour in Songewarie - for I se it ofte faille Caton and Canonistres - counseillen vs to leue To sette sadnesse in Songewarie - for sompnia ne cures Ac for þe book bible - bereþ witnesse How Daniel diuined þe dreem of a kyng That was Nabugodonosor nempned of clerkes As for what that all means, your guess is as good as mine I'm afraid, although it isn't that hard to work out with a little thought. Why should I let the toad work Squat on my life ? Can't I use my wit as a pitchfork And drive the brute off ? Read all about my travels around the world here. Read even more of my travel writing and poems on my weblog. |
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First, Bob, an observational comment regarding your latest signature: When I first look at your signature, 2 words always pop out at me: "squat" and "pitchfork." You can imagine what thoughts emerge from that!
Now, back to "Ullapse." I believe I have exhausted all attempts to find out more about that word. It is not in Google or in any of the online dictionaries, and my all-knowing logophile friend hasn't heard of it. There is nowhere else to turn! |
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First of all, I'm not surprised that ullapse doesn't appear. It is from a dictionary of an oobscure rural dialect published a hundred and fifty years ago and, as with many regional words, it's unlikely that it ever made it out of the immediate area of it's use and into the wider world.
Now today's seasonally themed word is yule-hole The last hole to which a man could stretch his belt at a Christmas feast. - Alexander Warrack's Scots Dialect Dictionary, 1911 Why should I let the toad work Squat on my life ? Can't I use my wit as a pitchfork And drive the brute off ? Read all about my travels around the world here. Read even more of my travel writing and poems on my weblog. |
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I missed yesterday so here are two more words from the calendar.
cates Provisions, delicacies. Said to be a corruption of delicates, or dainty meats; more probably from French acheter, to buy. - Rev. Percy Smith's Glossary of Terms and Phrases, 1883 climacteric By the climacteric system seven years was declared to be the termination of childhood; fourteen the term of puberty;twenty one of adult age;thirty five as the height of physical and bodily strength. At forty nine the person reached the height of his mental strength; at sixty three he was said to have reached thegrand climacteric. T. Ellwood Zell's Popular Encyclopedia of Knowledge And Language, 1871 Unusually for this calendar there is also a supporting quote for that second one. When about forty years old she [Joanna Southcott] assumed the pretensions of prophetess and declared herself to be the woman mentioned in the twelfth Book of Revelation. She asserted that she had received a divine appointment to be the mother of the Messiah after she had passed her grand climacteric. Chamber's Book of Days (1864) Why should I let the toad work Squat on my life ? Can't I use my wit as a pitchfork And drive the brute off ? Read all about my travels around the world here. Read even more of my travel writing and poems on my weblog. |
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Today I have just had a pint or several at the Skimmington Castle. Who knows what a Skimmington was?
Richard English |
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Well, I had to look it up. Does that count? It seems to be more of a British word, derived from a skimming ladle, which was wielded by an angry wife. It is an interesting word. I read several sites describing "riding skimmington," which I didn't completely understand. Effigies of guilty parties were paraded down streets on the back of a donkey? The word seems to denote moral outrage.
[This message was edited by Kalleh on Sat Dec 27th, 2003 at 15:26.] |
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What an interesting word!
The OED Online defines it as 1. The man or woman personating the ill-used husband or the offending wife in the procession (see 2) intended to ridicule the one or the other. Also transf., a husband whose wife is unfaithful to him; a shrewish woman. Obs. 2. A ludicrous procession, formerly common in villages and country districts, usually intended to bring ridicule or odium upon a woman or her husband in cases where the one was unfaithful to, or ill-treated, the other. As Kalleh said, you can find several web sites about it. I found in on World Wide Words. If you read a while you'll come across the word shivaree. The AHD has a description of a shivaree under Regional Note. It says it was a Midwestern and Western US custom, but I think it was more widespread than that. I found a site that talks about wedding customs in the Cumberland (Kentucky). The WWW site says skimmington probably came from skimming ladle, but the AHD says it was "perhaps the name of some notorious scold". I had never heard scold as a noun before, so I looked it up in M-W and found it is "a. one who scolds habitually or persistently b : a woman who disturbs the public peace by noisy and quarrelsome or abusive behavior". The AHD discusses the Word History of scold. It sounds more likely to me that skimmington came from skimming ladle than from scold. Tinman |
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Skimmington
(n.) A word employed in the phrase, To ride Skimmington; that is to ride on a horse with a woman, but behind her, facing backward, carrying a distaff, and accompanied by a procession of jeering neighbors making mock music; a cavalcade in ridicule of a henpecked man. The custom was in vogue in parts of England. * ** *** ***** ******** ******** ***** *** ** * Scold (n.) One who scolds, or makes a practice of scolding; esp., a rude, clamorous woman; a shrew. [This message was edited by jerry thomas on Sat Dec 27th, 2003 at 1:05.] |
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I can understand the confusion!
In fact, those scenes are of a meeting of the Surrey Vintage Vehicle Club who chose to gather at the Skimmington Castle which is, as you will appreciate, a pub. Nobody seems to know why it is thus called and the name does, as several have discovered, mean an unruly procession, apparently often held to shame a scolding woman. Skimmingtons have not happened for many years, the custom of punishing scolds having died out in England (some might say that's a pity but I wouldn't dare to, of course!) Richard English |
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The definition for today's word could hardly be shorter.
capelclawer Horse-scrubber - Herbert Coleridge's Dictionary of the Older Words in the English Language, 1863 A search on the internet found a definition as "scurvey fellow" on a site with lots of other good 16th century words so I imagine that "horse scrubber" is meant as some kind of insult in the calendar definition. Why should I let the toad work Squat on my life ? Can't I use my wit as a pitchfork And drive the brute off ? Read all about my travels around the world here. Read even more of my travel writing and poems on my weblog. |
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Thanks for posting that 16th century dictionary in our Links for Linguaphiles thread, Bob; it's a real gem!
 [Though, it doesn't have "epicaricacy."  ] |
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quote: It makes sense. Capel is an obsolete word meaning "horse" or "nag", and clawer is "one who claws" (1603; OED Online), so a capelclawer would be a horse groomer or "horse-scrubber". I don't imagine that was a particularly prestigious job back in the 16th century. Capel is also spelled caple and capul in the OED Online. It gives quotes from 1290 to 1819. Tinman |
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parmateer
An almost obsolete American political term formerly used in Rhode Island as a synonym for "electioneer". Probably derived from the French parler - to speak - via "parliament". John Farmer's - Americanisms Old And New, 1889 My internet search failed to turn up anything further other than use of Parmateer as a surname. Why should I let the toad work Squat on my life ? Can't I use my wit as a pitchfork And drive the brute off ? Read all about my travels around the world here. Read even more of my travel writing and poems on my weblog. |
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