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The Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue dates from 1811 and this is probably the only full, uncensored and searchable
version of this dictionary on the internet. All the original crudities have been restored and it offers an
interesting perspective on Common English from the time of the Regency and Jane Austen.
Select a letter or type a word and click Find. Searches are automatically wild-carded and clicking on words in the first column will look for all occurrences of that word, or related word.
Example:You click A and one of the results is ARSE. If you now click on ARSE the full list of related content will be displayed.
A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z
Select a letter or type a word and click Find. Searches are automatically wild-carded and clicking on words in the first column will look for all occurrences of that word, or related word.
Example:You click A and one of the results is ARSE. If you now click on ARSE the full list of related content will be displayed.
A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z
Entries releated to GALL
| ACORN | You will ride a horse foaled by an acorn, i.e. the gallows, called also the Wooden and Three-legged Mare. You will be hanged. - See THREE-LEGGED MARE. ACT OF PARLIAMENT. A military term for small beer, five pints of which, by an act of parliament, a landlord was formerly obliged to give to each soldier gratis. | |
| APOTHECARY | To talk like an apothecary; to use hard or gallipot words: from the assumed gravity and affectation of knowledge generally put on by the gentlemen of this profession, who are commonly as superficial in their learning as they are pedantic in their language. | |
| CHATES | The gallows. | |
| CHATTS | Lice: perhaps an abbreviation of chattels, lice being the chief live stock of chattels of beggars, gypsies, and the rest of the canting crew. - Also, according to the canting academy, the gallows. | |
| CLIMB | To climb the three trees with a ladder; to ascend the gallows. | |
| COCK YOUR EYE | Shut one eye: thus translated into apothecaries Latin. - Gallus tuus ego. | |
| COW'S COURANT | Gallop and shite. | |
| CURE ARSE | A dyachilon plaister, applied to the parts galled by riding. | |
| DANGLE | To follow a woman without asking the question. Also, to be hanged: I shall see you dangle in the sheriff's picture frame; I shall see you hanging on the gallows. | |
| DEADLY NEVERGREEN | Tree that bears fruit all the year round. The gallows, or three-legged mare. See THREE-LEGGEB MARE. | |
| DERRICK | The name of the finisher of the law, or hangman about the year 1608. - 'For he rides his circuit with the Devil, and Derrick must be his host, and Tiburne the inne at which he will lighte.' Vide Bellman of London, in art. PRIGGIN LAW. - 'At the gallows, where I leave them, as to the haven at which they must all cast anchor, if Derrick's cables do but hold.' | |
| DIE HARD, or GAME | To die hard, is to shew no signs of fear or contrition at the gallows; not to whiddle or squeak. This advice is frequently given to felons going to suffer the law, by their old comrades, anxious for the honour of the gang. | |
| DISMAL DITTY | The psalm sung by the felons at the gallows, just before they are turned off. | |
| DUNGHILL | A coward: a cockpit phrase, all but gamecocks being styled dunghills. To die dunghill; to repent, or shew any signs of contrition at the gallows. Moving dunghill; a dirty, filthy man or woman. Dung, an abbreviation of dunghill, also means a journeyman taylor who submits to the law for regulating journeymen taylors' wages, therefore deemed by the flints a coward. See FLINTS. | |
| GALL | His gall is not yet broken; a saying used in prisons of a man just brought in, who appears dejected. | |
| GALLEY | Building the galley; a game formerly used at sea, in order to put a trick upon a landsman, or fresh- water sailor. It being agreed to play at that game, one sailor personates the builder, and another the merchant or contractor: the builder first begins by laying the keel, which consists of a number of men laid all along on their backs, one after another, that is, head to foot; he next puts in the ribs or knees, by making a number of men sit feet to feet, at right angles to, and on each side of, the keel: he now fixing on the person intended to be the object of the joke, observes he is a fierce-looking fellow, and fit for the lion; he accordingly places him at the head, his arms being held or locked in by the two persons next to him, representing the ribs. After several other dispositions, the builder delivers over the galley to the contractor as complete: but he, among other faults and objections, observes the lion is not gilt, on which the builder or one of his assistants, runs to the head, and dipping a mop in the excrement, thrusts it into the face of the lion. | |
| GALLEY FOIST | A city barge, used formerly on the lord mayor's day, when he was sworn in at Westminster. | |
| GALLIED | Hurried, vexed, over-fatigued, perhaps like a galley slave. | |
| GALLIGASKINS | Breeches. | |
| GALLIPOT | A nick namefor an apothecary, | |
| GALLOPER | A blood horse. A hunter. The toby gill clapped his bleeders to his galloper and tipped the straps the double. The highwayman spurred his horse and got away from the officers. | |
| GALLORE, or GOLORE | Plenty. | |
| GALLOWS BIRD | A grief, or pickpocket; also one that associates with them. | |
| GAME | Bubbles or pigeons drawn in to be cheated. Also, at bawdy-houses, lewd women. Mother have you any game; mother, have you any girls? To die game; to suffer at the gallows without shewing any signs of fear or repentance. Game pullet; a young whore, or forward girl in the way of becoming one. | |
| GANDER MONTH | That month in which a man's wife-lies in: wherefore, during that time, husbands plead a sort of indulgence in matters of gallantry. | |
| GIB CAT | A northern name for a he cat, there commonly called Gilbert. As melancholy as a gib cat; as melancholy as a he cat who has been caterwauling, whence they always return scratched, hungry, and out of spirits. Aristotle says, Omne animal post coitum est triste; to which an anonymous author has given the following exception, preter gallum gallinaceum, et sucerdotem gratis fornicantem. | |
| GREGORIAN TREE | The gallows: so named from Gregory Brandon, a famous finisher of the law; to whom Sir William Segar, garter king of arms (being imposed on by Brooke, a herald), granted a coat of arms. | |
| HANG GALLOWS LOOK | A thievish, or villainous appearance. | |
| HOLBORN HILL | To ride backwards up Holborn hill; to go to the gallows: the way to Tyburn, the place of execution for criminals condemned in London, was up that hill. Criminals going to suffer, always ride backwards, as some conceive to increase the ignominy, but more probably to prevent them being shocked with a distant view of the gallows; as, in amputations, surgeons conceal the instruments with which they are going to operate. The last execution at Tyburn, and consequently of this procession, was in the year 1784, since which the criminals have been executed near Newgate | |
| KICKS | Breeches. A high kick; the top of the fashion. It is all the kick; it is the present mode. Tip us your kicks, we'll have them as well as your lour; pull off your breeches, for we must have them as well as your money. A kick; sixpence. Two and a kick; half-a-crown. A kick in the guts; a dram of gin, or any other spirituous liquor. A kick up; a disturbance, also a hop or dance. An odd kick in one's gallop; a strange whim or peculiarity. | |
| LEATHER | To lose leather; to be galled with riding on horseback, or, as the Scotch express it, to be saddle sick. To leather also meant to beat, perhaps originally with a strap: I'll leather you to your heart's content. Leather-headed; stupid. Leathern conveniency; term used by quakers for a stage-coach. | |
| LONG GALLERY | Throwing, or rather trundling, the dice the whole length of the board. | |
| MORNING DROP | The gallows. He napped the king's pardon and escaped the morning drop; he was pardoned, and was not hanged. | |
| NECK VERSE | Formerly the persons claiming the benefit of clergy were obliged to read a verse in a Latin manuscript psalter: this saving them from the gallows, was termed their neck verse: it was the first verse of the fiftyfirst psalm, Miserere mei,etc. | |
| NEWMAN'S LIFT | The gallows. | |
| NUBBING | Hanging. Nubbing cheat: the gallows. Nubbing cove; the hangman. Nubbing ken; the sessions house. | |
| PICTURE FRAME | The sheriff's picture frame; the gallows or pillory. | |
| PIT | To lay pit and boxes into one; an operation in midwifery or copulation, whereby the division between the anus and vagina is cut through, broken, and demolished: a simile borrowed from the playhouse, when, for the benefit of some favourite player, the pit and boxes are laid together. The pit is also the hole under the gallows, where poor rogues unable to pay the fees are buried. | |
| POPS | Pistols. Popshop: a pawnbroker's shop. To pop; to pawn: also to shoot. I popped my tatler; I pawned my watch. I popt the cull; I shot the man. His means are two pops and a galloper; that is, he is a highwayman. | |
| PRAY | She prays with her knees upwards; said of a woman much given to gallantry and intrigue. At her last prayers; saying of an old maid. | |
| SADDLE | To saddle the spit; to give a dinner or supper. To saddle one's nose; to wear spectacles. To saddle a place or pension; to oblige the holder to pay a certain portion of his income to some one nominated by the donor. Saddle sick: galled with riding, having lost leather. | |
| SCAPEGALLOWS | One who deserves and has narrowly escaped the gallows, a slip-gibbet, one for whom the gallows is said to groan. | |
| SHAFTSBURY | A gallon pot full of wine, with a cock. | |
| SHERIFF'S PICTURE FRAME | The gallows. | |
| SLIPGIBBET | See SCAPEGALLOWS. | |
| SPANK | To run neatly along, beteeen a trot and gallop. The tits spanked it to town; the horses went merrily along all the way to town. | |
| SUSPENCE | One in a deadly suspence; a man just turned off at the gallows. | |
| THATCH-GALLOWS | A rogue, or man of bad character. | |
| THREE-LEGGED MARE, or STOOL | The gallows, formerly consisting of three posts, over which were laid three transverse beams. This clumsy machine has lately given place to an elegant contrivance, called the NEW DROP, by which the use of that vulgar vehicle a cart, or mechanical instrument a ladder, is also avoided; the patients being left suspended by the dropping down of that part of the floor on which they stand. This invention was first made use of for a peer. See DROP. | |
| TITTUP | A gentle hand gallop, or canter. | |
| TOAST | A health; also a beautiful woman whose health is often drank by men. The origin of this term (as it is said) was this: a beautiful lady bathing in a cold bath, one of her admirers out of gallantry drank some of the water: whereupon another of her lovers observed, he never drank in the morning, but he would kiss the toast, and immediately saluted the lady. | |
| TOPPING CHEAT | The gallows. | |