The First English Dictionary of Slang 1699

Author: B. E.
Publisher:
ISBN: 9781851243488
Category : Cant
Languages : en
Pages : 0

Book Description
Written originally for the education of the polite London classes in 'canting' - the language of thieves and ruffians - should they be so unlucky as to wander into the 'wrong' parts of town, A New Dictionary of Terms, Ancient and Modern, of the Canting Crew by 'B.E. Gent' is the first work dedicated solely to the subject of slang words and their meanings. It is also the first text which attempts to show the overlap and integration between canting words and common slang. In its refusal to distinguish between criminal vocabulary and the more ordinary everyday English of the period, it sets canting words side by side with terms used by sailors, labourers, and those in the common currency of domestic culture.With an introduction by John Simpson, chief editor of the Oxford English Dictionary, describing the history and culture of canting in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, as well as the evolution of English slang, this is a fascinating volume for anyone with a curiosity about language, or wishing to reintroduce 'Dandyprat' or 'Fizzle' into their everyday conversation.Anglers, c Cheats, petty Thievs, who have a Stick with a hook at the end, with which they pluck things out of Windows, Grates, &c. also those that draw in People to be cheated.Dandyprat, a little puny Fellow.Grumbletonians, Malecontents, out of Humour with the Government, for want of a Place, or having lost one.Strum, c. a Periwig. Rum-Strum, c. a long Wig; also a handsom Wench, or Strumpet.

The First English Dictionary of Slang 1699

Author: B. E. Gent
Publisher:
ISBN: 9781851243877
Category : Cant
Languages : en
Pages : 0

Book Description
Written originally for the education of the polite London classes in 'canting' - the language of thieves and ruffians - should they be so unlucky as to wander into the 'wrong' parts of town, A New Dictionary of Terms, Ancient and Modern, of the Canting Crew by 'B.E. Gent' is the first work dedicated solely to the subject of slang words and their meanings. It is also the first text which attempts to show the overlap and integration between canting words and common slang. In its refusal to distinguish between criminal vocabulary and the more ordinary everyday English of the period, it sets canting words side by side with terms used by sailors, labourers, and those in the common currency of domestic culture. With an introduction by John Simpson, chief editor of the Oxford English Dictionary, describing the history and culture of canting in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, as well as the evolution of English slang, this is a fascinating volume for anyone with a curiosity about language, or wishing to reintroduce 'Dandyprat' or 'Fizzle' into their everyday conversation. Anglers, c Cheats, petty Thievs, who have a Stick with a hook at the end, with which they pluck things out of Windows, Grates, &c. also those that draw in People to be cheated. Dandyprat, a little puny Fellow. Grumbletonians, Malecontents, out of Humour with the Government, for want of a Place, or having lost one. Strum, c. a Periwig. Rum-Strum, c. a long Wig; also a handsom Wench, or Strumpet.

A Table Alphabeticall of Hard Usual English Words (1604)

Author: Robert Cawdry
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : English language
Languages : en
Pages : 150

Book Description

Disease and Death in Eighteenth-Century Literature and Culture

Author: Allan Ingram
Publisher: Springer
ISBN: 1137597186
Category : Literary Criticism
Languages : en
Pages : 289

Book Description
This collection examines different aspects of attitudes towards disease and death in writing of the long eighteenth century. Taking three conditions as examples – ennui, sexual diseases and infectious diseases – as well as death itself, contributors explore the ways in which writing of the period placed them within a borderland between fashionability and unfashionability, relating them to current social fashions and trends. These essays also look at ways in which diseases were fashioned into bearing cultural, moral, religious and even political meaning. Works of literature are used as evidence, but also medical writings, personal correspondence and diaries. Diseases or conditions subject to scrutiny include syphilis, male impotence, plague, smallpox and consumption. Death, finally, is looked at both in terms of writers constructing meanings within death and of the fashioning of posthumous reputation.

The First English Dictionary 1604

Author: Robert Cawdrey
Publisher:
ISBN: 9781851243884
Category : English language
Languages : en
Pages : 0

Book Description
English is one of the most complicated languages to learn, and its constantly evolving vocabulary certainly doesn't help matters. For centuries, men and women have striven to chronicle and categorize the expressions of the English language, and Samuel Johnson is usually thought to be their original predecessor. But that lineage is wrong: Robert Cawdrey published his Table Alphabeticall in 1604, 149 years before Johnson's tome, and it is now republished here for the first time in over 350 years. This edition, prepared from the sole surviving copy of the first printing, documents Cawdrey's fascinating selection of 2,543 words and their first-ever definitions. Cawdrey subtitled his dictionary "for the benefit of Ladies, Gentlewomen, and other unskilled folk," for his aim was not to create a comprehensive catalog, but rather an in-depth guide for the lesser educated who might not know the "hard usual English wordes, borrowed from the Hebrew, Greeke, Latine, or French." Each entry reveals an intriguing facet of early modern life and the cultural mores of the time. There are familiar terms--"geometrie" was defined as "the art of measuring the earth," and a "concubine" was described as a "harlot, or light huswife"--and amusingly idiomatic definitions: "prodigall" is "too riotous in spending," while "hecticke" is "inflaming the hart, and soundest parts of the bodie." John Simpson, chief editor of the Oxford English Dictionary, contributes an insightful introduction that recounts the eventful life of Robert Cawdrey and his mission to become the first English lexicographer. A treasure-trove of linguistic oddity and history for the bibliophile, budding lexicographer, or obsessive Scrabble player, The First English Dictionary, 1604 reveals the roots of our language in all its eccentric glory.

Night Became Years

Author: Jason Stefanik
Publisher: Coach House Books
ISBN: 177056540X
Category : Poetry
Languages : en
Pages : 73

Book Description
Night Became Years is poetry in the sauntering tradition of the flâneur. Stefanik loafers his way over sacred geography and explores his own mixed heritage through the lexicon of Elizabethan canting language. Comparing the terminology of fifteenth-century English beggar vernacular with a contemporary Canadian inner-city worldview, the poems in Night Became Years unfold as separate entities while at the same time forming a larger narrative on the possibilities of poetry today and the nature of mixed-blood identity.

The Place of Stone

Author: Douglas Hunter
Publisher: UNC Press Books
ISBN: 1469634414
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 343

Book Description
Claimed by many to be the most frequently documented artifact in American archeology, Dighton Rock is a forty-ton boulder covered in petroglyphs in southern Massachusetts. First noted by New England colonists in 1680, the rock's markings have been debated endlessly by scholars and everyday people alike on both sides of the Atlantic. The glyphs have been erroneously assigned to an array of non-Indigenous cultures: Norsemen, Egyptians, Lost Tribes of Israel, vanished Portuguese explorers, and even a prince from Atlantis. In this fascinating story rich in personalities and memorable characters, Douglas Hunter uses Dighton Rock to reveal the long, complex history of colonization, American archaeology, and the conceptualization of Indigenous people. Hunter argues that misinterpretations of the rock's markings share common motivations and have erased Indigenous people not only from their own history but from the landscape. He shows how Dighton Rock for centuries drove ideas about the original peopling of the Americas, including Bering Strait migration scenarios and the identity of the "Mound Builders." He argues the debates over Dighton Rock have served to answer two questions: Who belongs in America, and to whom does America belong?

The Once & Future Witch Hunt

Author: Alice Markham-Cantor
Publisher: Llewellyn Worldwide
ISBN: 0738777234
Category : Body, Mind & Spirit
Languages : en
Pages : 326

Book Description
Past and present collide in this page-turner investigation into Salem's irrepressible question: How could this have happened? In 1692, Martha Allen Carrier was hanged in the Salem witch trials as the "Queen of Hell." Three hundred years later, her nine-times-great-granddaughter, Alice Markham-Cantor, set out to discover why Martha had died. As she chased her ancestor through the archives, graveyards, and haunted places of New England, grappling with what we owe the past, Alice discovered a shocking truth: witch hunts didn't end in Salem. Extensively researched and told through alternating fiction and non-fiction chapters, The Once & Future Witch Hunt does not treat Salem as a cautionary tale. It treats Salem as an instruction manual—not on how to perform witch hunts, but how to stop them. Foreword by Rebecca Traister, New York Times bestselling author. Afterword by Silvia Federici, author of Caliban and the Witch.

A History of Cant and Slang Dictionaries

Author: Julie Coleman
Publisher: OUP Oxford
ISBN: 9780199557097
Category : Language Arts & Disciplines
Languages : en
Pages : 272

Book Description
This is the first volume in a complete history of the documentation of English cant and slang from 1567 to the present. It gives unparalleled insights into the early history of slang, the people who used it, and how and why it was recorded. It also provides unusual and unexpected insights into the underworlds of early modern England.

The Oxford Dictionary of Slang

Author: John Ayto
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Reference
Languages : en
Pages : 488

Book Description
Slang is language with its sleeves rolled up, colorful, pointed, brash, bristling with humor and sometimes with hostility. Now, in The Oxford Dictionary of Slang, John Ayto has brought together over 10,000 slang words and phrases common to 20th-century English, to provide a comprehensive and highly engaging guide to the most outspoken corner of our language. Unlike most such dictionaries, this volume is organized thematically, with slang words gathered under such headings as "the body and its functions" or "sustenance and intoxication." Within each section, the words are listed chronologically, starting with the century's earliest words and phrases and progressing right through to the present day, thus illuminating the development of slang and colloquial language over the last hundred years. Word origins and other interesting features of usage are given wherever possible, as are illustrative quotations from a wide range of authors. A comprehensive A Z index lists all words included in the dictionary, so you can find a particular word quickly. From "five-finger discount" to "forty-rod whiskey," here is an authoritative and up-to-date record of slang throughout the English-speaking world.