![]() ![]() When walking or otherwise getting around, you could ask people to let you pass, please. Make a stuffed bird laughĪ street term meaning coward. Kruger-spoofĪn excellent word that means getting rowdy in the streets. “Absolutely perfect young females,” circa 1883. Use of this 1880 phrase indicated temporary melancholy. Gas-PipesĪ term for especially tight pants. ![]() Gal-sneakerĪn 1870 term for "a man devoted to seduction.” 27. Fly rinkĪn 1875 term for a polished bald head. Not the game you might be familiar with, but a term meaning complete and absolute confusion. "Satirical reference to enthusiasm." Created by Braham the terror, whoever that is. Door-knockerĪ type of beard "formed by the cheeks and chin being shaved leaving a chain of hair under the chin, and upon each side of mouth forming with moustache something like a door-knocker." 23. Popular until 1870, this phrase meant “Don’t lie to me!” Apparently, people who sold dogs back in the day were prone to trying to pass off mutts as purebreds. Dizzy AgeĪ phrase meaning "elderly," because it "makes the spectator giddy to think of the victim's years." The term usually refers to "a maiden or other woman canvassed by other maiden ladies or others.” 20. This creative cuss is a contraction of “damned if I know.” 19. DaddlesĪ delightful way to refer to your rather boring hands. “Cop in this sense is to catch or suffer," Forrester writes, "while the colour of the obligation at its worst suggests the colour and size of the innocent animal named.” 17. A term from Queen Victoria’s journal, More Leaves, published in 1884: “At five minutes to eleven rode off with Beatrice, good Sharp going with us, and having occasional collie shangles (a Scottish word for quarrels or rows, but taken from fights between dogs) with collies when we came near cottages.” 16. Church-bellĪ nickname given to a close friend. in club-life is one of the more ignominious names given to champagne by men who prefer stronger liquors.” 13. Cat-lapĪ London society term for tea and coffee “used scornfully by drinkers of beer and strong waters. “Are you going to put lace over the feather, isn't that rather butter upon bacon?” 12. Forrester cites The Golden Butterfly: "I will back a first-class British subject for bubbling around against all humanity." 11. Bubble AroundĪ verbal attack, generally made via the press. “Adroit after the manner of a brick," Forrester writes, "said even of the other sex, 'What a bricky girl she is.'” 10. Bow wow muttonĪ naval term referring to meat so bad “it might be dog flesh.”īrave or fearless. Nineteenth-century sailor slang for “A riotous holiday, a noisy day in the streets.” 8. Low London phrase meaning “to thrash thoroughly,” possibly from the French battre a fin. This phrase originated in London in 1882, and means “perfect, complete, unapproachable.” 6. The 'bag' refers to the gut which contained the chopped meat.” 5. Bags o’ MysteryĪn 1850 term for sausages, “because no man but the maker knows what is in them. ![]() Thieves used this term to indicate that they wanted “to go out the back way.” 4. “He’s very arf’arf’an’arf," Forrester writes, "meaning he has had many ‘arfs,’” or half-pints of booze. Arfarfan'arfĪ figure of speech used to describe drunken men. AfternoonifiedĪ society word meaning “smart.” Forrester demonstrates the usage: “The goods are not 'afternoonified' enough for me.” 2. "‘Passing English’ ripples from countless sources, forming a river of new language which has its tide and its ebb, while its current brings down new ideas and carries away those that have dribbled out of fashion." Forrester chronicles many hilarious and delightful words in Passing English we don't know how these phrases ever fell out of fashion, but we propose bringing them back. "Thousands of words and phrases in existence in 1870 have drifted away, or changed their forms, or been absorbed, while as many have been added or are being added," he writes in the book's introduction. In 1909, British writer James Redding Ware (who also wrote under the pseudonym Andrew Forrester) published Passing English of the Victorian era, a dictionary of heterodox English, slang and phrase. ![]()
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