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Rhyming slang is a form of slang word construction in the English language. It is especially prevalent among Cockneys in England, and was first used in the early 19th century in the East End of London; hence its alternative name, Cockney rhyming slang. [2] [3] In the US, especially the criminal underworld of the West Coast between 1880 and 1920, rhyming slang has sometimes been known as Australian slang. [4] [5] [6]
The construction of rhyming slang involves replacing a common word with a phrase of two or more words, the last of which rhymes with the original word; then, in almost all cases, omitting, from the end of the phrase, the secondary rhyming word (which is thereafter implied), [7] [ page needed ] [8] [ page needed ] making the origin and meaning of the phrase elusive to listeners not in the know. [9] [ page needed ]
The form of Cockney slang is made clear with the following example. The rhyming phrase "apples and pears" is used to mean "stairs". Following the pattern of omission, "and pears" is dropped, thus the spoken phrase "I'm going up the apples" means "I'm going up the stairs". [10]
The following are further common examples of these phrases: [10] [11] [12]
Slang word | Meaning | Original phrase |
---|---|---|
Aristotle | Bottle | Bottle |
Aris | Arse (backside) | This is the result of a double rhyme, starting with the original rough synonym "arse", which is rhymed with "bottle and glass", leading to "bottle". "Bottle" was then rhymed with "Aristotle" and truncated to "Aris" |
Bird | Time | Bird lime |
Bottle | Arse (backside) | Bottle and Glass |
Brassic (Boracic) | skint (Penniless) | Boracic lint |
Bristols | Titty | Bristol City |
Britneys | Beers | Britney Spears |
Butchers | Look | Butcher's hook: e.g. "Let's have a butchers at that." |
China | Mate | China Plate |
Threepennys (thruppny)s | Tits (Breasts) | Threepenny bits |
Dog | Telephone | Dog and Bone |
Frog | Road | Frog and Toad |
Gary [13] | Tablet (Ecstasy) | Gary Ablett |
Grass | Informer | Grasshopper: copper ("police officer") or shopper ("cop-shop") |
Gregory | Neck | Gregory Peck: e.g. "Stop breathing down my Gregory!" |
Hampsteads | Teeth | Hampstead Heath |
Khyber | Arse | Khyber Pass |
Loaf | Head | Loaf of Bread: e.g. "Use your loaf!" |
Marvin | Starving | Hank Marvin |
Minces | Eyes | Mince pies |
Porkies | Lies | Pork pies: e.g. "Have you been telling me porkies?" |
Plates | Feet | Plates of meat |
Raspberry | Cripple | Raspberry Ripple |
Rub | Pub | Rub-a-dub-dub |
Septic (abbr: seppo) | Yank | Septic Tank |
Syrup | Wig | Syrup of figs |
Titfer (Tit for) | Hat | Tit for tat |
Tom | Jewellery | Tomfoolery |
Trouble | Wife | Trouble and strife |
Treacle | Sweetheart | Treacle Tart |
Turkish | Laugh | Turkish bath (referring to a Victorian Turkish bath, rather than a Hammam.) |
Whistle | Suit | Whistle and flute |
In some examples the meaning is further obscured by adding a second iteration of rhyme and truncation to the original rhymed phrase. For example, the word "Aris" is often used to indicate the buttocks. This is the result of a double rhyme, starting with the original rough synonym "arse", which is rhymed with "bottle and glass", leading to "bottle". "Bottle" was then rhymed with "Aristotle" and truncated to "Aris". "Aris" was then rhymed with "plaster of Paris" and truncated to "plaster". [14]
Ghil'ad Zuckermann, a linguist and revivalist, has proposed a distinction between rhyming slang based on sound only, and phono-semantic rhyming slang, which includes a semantic link between the slang expression and its referent (the thing it refers to). [15] : 29 An example of rhyming slang based only on sound is the Cockney "tea leaf" (thief). [15] : 29 An example of phono-semantic rhyming slang is the Cockney "sorrowful tale" ((three months in) jail), [15] : 30 in which case the person coining the slang term sees a semantic link, sometimes jocular, between the Cockney expression and its referent. [15] : 30
The use of rhyming slang has spread beyond the purely dialectal and some examples are to be found in the mainstream British English lexicon, although many users may be unaware of the origin of those words. [10]
Most of the words changed by this process are nouns, but a few are adjectival, e.g., "bales" of cotton (rotten), or the adjectival phrase "on one's tod" for "on one's own", after Tod Sloan, a famous jockey. [2] [18]
Rhyming slang is believed to have originated in the mid-19th century in the East End of London, with several sources suggesting some time in the 1840s. [19] : 12 [20] [21] The Flash Dictionary, of unknown authorship, published in 1921 by Smeeton (48mo), contains a few rhymes. [22] : 3 John Camden Hotten's 1859 Dictionary of Modern Slang, Cant, and Vulgar Words likewise states that it originated in the 1840s ("about twelve or fifteen years ago"), but with "chaunters" and "patterers" in the Seven Dials area of London. [20] Hotten's Dictionary included the first known "Glossary of the Rhyming Slang", which included later mainstays such as "frog and toad" (the main road) and "apples and pears" (stairs), as well as many more obscure examples, e.g. "Battle of the Nile" (a tile, a common term for a hat), "Duke of York" (take a walk), and "Top of Rome" (home). [20] [23] [22]
It remains a matter of speculation exactly how rhyming slang originated, for example, as a linguistic game among friends or as a cryptolect developed intentionally to confuse non-locals. If deliberate, it may also have been used to maintain a sense of community, or to allow traders to talk amongst themselves in marketplaces to facilitate collusion, without customers knowing what they were saying, or by criminals to confuse the police (see thieves' cant).[ citation needed ]
The academic, lexicographer and radio personality Terence Dolan has suggested that rhyming slang was invented by Irish immigrants to London "so the actual English wouldn't understand what they were talking about." [24]
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Many examples of rhyming slang are based on locations in London, such as "Peckham Rye", meaning "tie", [25] : 265 which dates from the late nineteenth century; "Hampstead Heath", meaning "teeth" [25] : 264 (usually as "Hampsteads"), which was first recorded in 1887; and "barnet" (Barnet Fair), meaning "hair", [25] : 231 which dates from the 1850s.
In the 20th century, rhyming slang began to be based on the names of celebrities — Gregory Peck (neck; cheque), [25] : 74 Ruby Murray [as Ruby] (curry), [25] : 159 Alan Whicker [as "Alan Whickers"] (knickers), [25] : 3 Puff Daddy (caddy), [25] : 147 Max Miller (pillow [pronounced /ˈpilə/ ]),[ citation needed ] Meryl Streep (cheap), [25] : 119 Nat King Cole ("dole"), [25] : 221 Britney Spears (beers, tears), [25] : 27 Henry Halls (balls) [25] : 82 — and after pop culture references — Captain Kirk (work), [25] : 33 Pop Goes the Weasel (diesel), [25] : 146 Mona Lisa (pizza), [25] : 122 Mickey Mouse (Scouse), [25] : 120 Wallace and Gromit (vomit), [25] : 195 Brady Bunch (lunch), [25] : 25 Bugs Bunny (money), [25] : 29 Scooby-Doo (clue), [25] : 164 Winnie the Pooh (shoe), [25] : 199 and Schindler's List (pissed). [25] : 163–164 Some words have numerous definitions, such as dead ( Father Ted , "gone to bed", brown bread), [25] : 220 door (Roger Moore, Andrea Corr, George Bernard Shaw, Rory O'Moore), [25] : 221 cocaine (Kurt Cobain; [as "Charlie"] Bob Marley, Boutros Boutros-Ghali, Gianluca Vialli, oats and barley; [as "line"] Patsy Cline; [as "powder"] Niki Lauda), [25] : 218 flares ("Lionel Blairs", "Tony Blairs", "Rupert Bears", "Dan Dares"), [25] : 225 etc.
Many examples have passed into common usage. Some substitutions have become relatively widespread in England in their contracted form. "To have a butcher's", meaning to have a look, originates from "butcher's hook", an S-shaped hook used by butchers to hang up meat, and dates from the late nineteenth century but has existed independently in general use from around the 1930s simply as "butchers". [25] : 30 Similarly, "use your loaf", meaning "use your head", derives from "loaf of bread" and also dates from the late nineteenth century but came into independent use in the 1930s. [9] [ page needed ]
Conversely usages have lapsed, or been usurped ("Hounslow Heath" for teeth, was replaced by "Hampsteads" from the heath of the same name, starting c. 1887). [26]
In some cases, false etymologies exist. For example, the term "barney" has been used to mean an altercation or fight since the late nineteenth century, although without a clear derivation. [27] In the 2001 feature film Ocean's Eleven , the explanation for the term is that it derives from Barney Rubble, [28] the name of a cartoon character from the Flintstones television program many decades later in origin. [25] : 14 [27]
Rhyming slang is used mainly in London in England but can, to some degree, be understood across the country. Some constructions, however, rely on particular regional accents for the rhymes to work. For instance, the term "Charing Cross" (a place in London), used to mean "horse" since the mid-nineteenth century, [9] [ page needed ] does not work for a speaker without the lot–cloth split, common in London at that time but not nowadays. A similar example is "Joanna" meaning "piano", which is based on the pronunciation of "piano" as "pianna" /piˈænə/ .[ citation needed ] Unique formations also exist in other parts of the United Kingdom, such as in the East Midlands, where the local accent has formed "Derby Road", which rhymes with "cold".[ citation needed ]
Outside England, rhyming slang is used in many English-speaking countries in the Commonwealth of Nations, with local variations. For example, in Australian slang, the term for an English person is "pommy", which has been proposed as a rhyme on "pomegranate", pronounced "Pummy Grant", which rhymed with "immigrant". [29] [30]
Rhyming slang is continually evolving, and new phrases are introduced all the time; new personalities replace old ones—pop culture introduces new words—as in "I haven't a Scooby" (from Scooby Doo, the eponymous cartoon dog of the cartoon series) meaning "I haven't a clue". [31]
Rhyming slang is often used as a substitute for words regarded as taboo, often to the extent that the association with the taboo word becomes unknown over time. "Berk" (often used to mean "foolish person") originates from the most famous of all fox hunts, the "Berkeley Hunt" meaning "cunt"; "cobblers" (often used in the context "what you said is rubbish") originates from "cobbler's awls", meaning "balls" (as in testicles); and "hampton" (usually "'ampton") meaning "prick" (as in penis) originates from "Hampton Wick" (a place in London) – the second part "wick" also entered common usage as "he gets on my wick" (he is an annoying person). [22] : 74
Lesser taboo terms include "pony and trap" for "crap" (as in defecate, but often used to denote nonsense or low quality); to blow a raspberry (rude sound of derision) from raspberry tart for "fart"; "D'Oyly Carte" (an opera company) for "fart"; "Jimmy Riddle" (an American country musician) for "piddle" (as in urinate), "J. Arthur Rank" (a film mogul), "Sherman tank", "Jodrell Bank" or "ham shank" for "wank", "Bristol Cities" (contracted to 'Bristols') for "titties", etc. "Taking the Mick" or "taking the Mickey" is thought to be a rhyming slang form of "taking the piss", where "Mick" came from "Mickey Bliss". [32]
In December 2004 Joe Pasquale, winner of the fourth series of ITV's I'm a Celebrity... Get Me Out of Here! , became well known for his frequent use of the term "Jacobs", for Jacob's Cream Crackers, a rhyming slang term for knackers i.e. testicles.
Rhyming slang has been widely used in popular culture including film, television, music, literature, sport and degree classification.
In the British undergraduate degree classification system a first class honours degree is known as a "Geoff Hurst" (First) after the English 1966 World Cup footballer. An upper second class degree (a.k.a. a "2:1") is called an "Attila the Hun", and a lower second class ("2:2") a "Desmond Tutu", while a third class degree is known as a "Thora Hird" or "Douglas Hurd". [33]
Cary Grant's character teaches rhyming slang to his female companion in Mr. Lucky (1943), describing it as 'Australian rhyming slang'. Rhyming slang is also used and described in a scene of the 1967 film To Sir, with Love starring Sidney Poitier, where the English students tell their foreign teacher that the slang is a drag and something for old people. [34] The closing song of the 1969 crime caper, The Italian Job , ("Getta Bloomin' Move On" a.k.a. "The Self Preservation Society") contains many slang terms.
Rhyming slang has been used to lend authenticity to an East End setting. Examples include Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels (1998) (wherein the slang is translated via subtitles in one scene); The Limey (1999); Sexy Beast (2000); Snatch (2000); Ocean's Eleven (2001); and Austin Powers in Goldmember (2002); It's All Gone Pete Tong (2004), after BBC radio disc jockey Pete Tong whose name is used in this context as rhyming slang for "wrong"; Green Street Hooligans (2005). In Margin Call (2011), Will Emerson, played by London-born actor Paul Bettany, asks a friend on the telephone, "How's the trouble and strife?" ("wife").
Cockneys vs Zombies (2012) mocked the genesis of rhyming slang terms when a Cockney character calls zombies "Trafalgars" to even his Cockney fellows' puzzlement; he then explains it thus: "Trafalgar square – fox and hare – hairy Greek – five day week – weak and feeble – pins and needles – needle and stitch – Abercrombie and Fitch – Abercrombie: zombie".
The live-action Disney film Mary Poppins Returns song "Trip A Little Light Fantastic" involves Cockney rhyming slang in part of its lyrics, and is primarily spoken by the London lamplighters.
In the animated superhero film Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse (2023), character Spider-Punk, a Camden native, is heard saying: "I haven't got a scooby" ("clue"). [35]
Slang had a resurgence of popular interest in Britain beginning in the 1970s, resulting from its use in a number of London-based television programmes such as Steptoe and Son (1970–74); and Not On Your Nellie (1974–75), starring Hylda Baker as Nellie Pickersgill, alludes to the phrase "not on your Nellie Duff", rhyming slang for "not on your puff" i.e. not on your life. Similarly, The Sweeney (1975–78) alludes to the phrase "Sweeney Todd" for "Flying Squad", a rapid response unit of London's Metropolitan Police. In The Fall and Rise of Reginald Perrin (1976–79), a comic twist was added to rhyming slang by way of spurious and fabricated examples which a young man had laboriously attempted to explain to his father (e.g. 'dustbins' meaning 'children', as in 'dustbin lids'='kids'; 'Teds' being 'Ted Heath' and thus 'teeth'; and even 'Chitty Chitty' being 'Chitty Chitty Bang Bang', and thus 'rhyming slang'...). It was also featured in an episode of The Good Life in the first season (1975) where Tom and Barbara purchase a wood-burning range from a junk trader called Sam, who litters his language with phony rhyming slang in hopes of convincing suburban residents that he is an authentic traditional Cockney trader. He comes up with a fake story as to the origin of Cockney rhyming slang and is caught out rather quickly. In The Jeffersons season 2 (1976) episode "The Breakup: Part 2", Mr. Bentley explains Cockney rhyming slang to George Jefferson, in that "whistle and flute" means "suit", "apples and pears" means "stairs", "plates of meat" means "feet".
The use of rhyming slang was also prominent in Mind Your Language (1977–79), Citizen Smith (1977–80), Minder [36] [ page needed ] (1979–94), Only Fools and Horses (1981–91), and EastEnders (1985–). Minder could be quite uncompromising in its use of obscure forms without any clarification. Thus the non-Cockney viewer was obliged to deduce that, say, "iron" was "male homosexual" ('iron'='iron hoof'='poof'). One episode in Series 5 of Steptoe and Son was entitled "Any Old Iron", for the same reason, when Albert thinks that Harold is 'on the turn'. Variations of rhyming slang were also used in sitcom Birds of a Feather , by main characters Sharon and Tracey, often to the confusion of character, Dorian Green, who was unfamiliar with the terms.
One early US show to regularly feature rhyming slang was the Saturday morning children's show The Bugaloos (1970–72), with the character of Harmony (Wayne Laryea) often incorporating it in his dialogue.
In popular music, Spike Jones and his City Slickers recorded "So 'Elp Me", based on rhyming slang, in 1950. The 1967 Kinks song "Harry Rag" was based on the usage of the name Harry Wragg as rhyming slang for "fag" (i.e. a cigarette). The idiom made a brief appearance in the UK-based DJ reggae music of the 1980s in the hit "Cockney Translation" by Smiley Culture of South London; this was followed a couple of years later by Domenick and Peter Metro's "Cockney and Yardie". London-based artists such as Audio Bullys and Chas & Dave (and others from elsewhere in the UK, such as The Streets, who are from Birmingham) frequently use rhyming slang in their songs.
British-born M.C. MF Doom released an ode entitled "Rhymin' Slang", after settling in the UK in 2010. The track was released on the 2012 JJ Doom album Key to the Kuffs .
Another contributor was Lonnie Donegan who had a song called "My Old Man's a Dustman". In it he says his father has trouble putting on his boots "He's got such a job to pull them up that he calls them daisy roots". [37]
In modern literature, Cockney rhyming slang is used frequently in the novels and short stories of Kim Newman, for instance in the short story collections "The Man from the Diogenes Club" (2006) and "Secret Files of the Diogenes Club" (2007), where it is explained at the end of each book. [38]
It is also parodied in Going Postal by Terry Pratchett, which features a geriatric Junior Postman by the name of Tolliver Groat, a speaker of 'Dimwell Arrhythmic Rhyming Slang', the only rhyming slang on the Disc which does not actually rhyme. Thus, a wig is a 'prunes', from 'syrup of prunes', an obvious parody of the Cockney syrup from syrup of figs – wig. There are numerous other parodies, though it has been pointed out that the result is even more impenetrable than a conventional rhyming slang and so may not be quite so illogical as it seems, given the assumed purpose of rhyming slang as a means of communicating in a manner unintelligible to all but the initiated.
In the book Goodbye to All That by Robert Graves, a beer is a "broken square" as Welch Fusiliers officers walk into a pub and order broken squares when they see men from the Black Watch. The Black Watch had a minor blemish on its record of otherwise unbroken squares. Fistfights ensued.
In Dashiell Hammett's The Dain Curse , the protagonist exhibits familiarity with Cockney rhyming slang, referring to gambling at dice with the phrase "rats and mice."
Cockney rhyming slang is one of the main influences for the dialect spoken in A Clockwork Orange (1962). [39] The author of the novel, Anthony Burgess, also believed the phrase "as queer as a clockwork orange" was Cockney slang having heard it in a London pub in 1945, and subsequently named it in the title of his book. [40]
In Scottish football, a number of clubs have nicknames taken from rhyming slang. Partick Thistle are known as the "Harry Rags", which is taken from the rhyming slang of their 'official' nickname "the jags". Rangers are known as the "Teddy Bears", which comes from the rhyming slang for "the Gers" (shortened version of Ran-gers). Heart of Midlothian are known as the "Jambos", which comes from "Jam Tarts" which is the rhyming slang for "Hearts" which is the common abbreviation of the club's name. Hibernian are also referred to as "The Cabbage" which comes from Cabbage and Ribs being the rhyming slang for Hibs. The phrase Hampden Roar (originally describing the loud crowd noise emanating from the national stadium) is employed as "What's the Hampden?", [41] ("What's the score?", idiom for "What's happening / what's going on?"). [41] [42]
In rugby league, "meat pie" is used for try. [43]
A Clockwork Orange is a dystopian satirical black comedy novella by English writer Anthony Burgess, published in March 17, 1962. It is set in a near-future society that has a youth subculture of extreme violence. The teenage protagonist, Alex, narrates his violent exploits and his experiences with state authorities intent on reforming him. The book is partially written in a Russian-influenced argot called "Nadsat", which takes its name from the Russian suffix that is equivalent to '-teen' in English. According to Burgess, the novel was a jeu d'esprit written in just three weeks.
British English is the set of varieties of the English language native to the United Kingdom. More narrowly, it can refer specifically to the English language in England, or, more broadly, to the collective dialects of English throughout the British Isles taken as a single umbrella variety, for instance additionally incorporating Scottish English, Welsh English, and Northern Irish English. Tom McArthur in the Oxford Guide to World English acknowledges that British English shares "all the ambiguities and tensions [with] the word 'British' and as a result can be used and interpreted in two ways, more broadly or more narrowly, within a range of blurring and ambiguity".
A rhyme is a repetition of similar sounds in the final stressed syllables and any following syllables of two or more words. Most often, this kind of rhyming is consciously used for a musical or aesthetic effect in the final position of lines within poems or songs. More broadly, a rhyme may also variously refer to other types of similar sounds near the ends of two or more words. Furthermore, the word rhyme has come to be sometimes used as a shorthand term for any brief poem, such as a nursery rhyme or Balliol rhyme.
A slang is a vocabulary of an informal register, common in everyday conversation but avoided in formal writing. It also often refers to the language exclusively used by the members of particular in-groups in order to establish group identity, exclude outsiders, or both. The word itself came about in the 18th century and has been defined in multiple ways since its conception, with no single technical usage in linguistics.
Cockney is a dialect of the English language, mainly spoken in London and its environs, particularly by Londoners with working-class and lower middle-class roots. The term Cockney is also used as a demonym for a person from the East End, or, traditionally, born within earshot of Bow Bells.
Nadsat is a fictional register or argot used by the teenage gang members in Anthony Burgess's dystopian novel A Clockwork Orange. Burgess was a linguist and he used this background to depict his characters as speaking a form of Russian-influenced English. The name comes from the Russian suffix equivalent of -teen as in thirteen. Nadsat was also used in Stanley Kubrick's film adaptation of the book.
In linguistics, a neologism is any newly formed word, term, or phrase that has achieved popular or institutional recognition and is becoming accepted into mainstream language. Most definitively, a word can be considered a neologism once it is published in a dictionary.
This glossary of names for the British include nicknames and terms, including affectionate ones, neutral ones, and derogatory ones to describe British people, Irish People and more specifically English, Welsh, Scottish and Northern Irish people. Many of these terms may vary between offensive, derogatory, neutral and affectionate depending on a complex combination of tone, facial expression, context, usage, speaker and shared past history.
Wanker is slang for "one who wanks (masturbates)", but is most often used as a general insult. It is a pejorative term of English origin common in Britain and other parts of the English-speaking world, including Ireland, Australia and New Zealand. It is synonymous with the insult tosser.
A cant is the jargon or language of a group, often employed to exclude or mislead people outside the group. It may also be called a cryptolect, argot, pseudo-language, anti-language or secret language. Each term differs slightly in meaning; their uses are inconsistent.
Australian English is a major variety of the English language spoken throughout Australia. Most of the vocabulary of Australian English is shared with British English, though there are notable differences. The vocabulary of Australia is drawn from many sources, including various dialects of British English as well as Gaelic languages, some Indigenous Australian languages, and Polynesian languages.
Taking the piss is a colloquial term meaning to either mock at the expense of others, or to be joking, without the element of offence; or to be 'unfair' and take more than is warranted. It is a shortening of the idiom taking the piss out of, which is an expression meaning to mock, tease, joke, ridicule, or scoff. Extracting the urine, Taking the Mickey, taking the Mick or taking the Michael are additional terms for making fun of someone. These terms are most often used in the United Kingdom, Ireland, South Africa, New Zealand, and Australia.
A slang dictionary is a reference book containing an alphabetical list of slang, which is vernacular vocabulary not generally acceptable in formal usage, usually including information given for each word, including meaning, pronunciation, and etymology. It can provide definitions on a range of slang from more mundane terms to obscure sexual practices. Such works also can include words and phrases arising from different dialects and argots, which may or may not have passed into more common usage. They can also track the changing meaning of the terms over time and space, as they migrate and mutate.
Fruit, fruity, and fruitcake, as well as its many variations, are slang or even sexual slang terms which have various origins. These terms have often been used derogatorily to refer to LGBT people. Usually used as pejoratives, the terms have also been re-appropriated as insider terms of endearment within LGBT communities. Many modern pop culture references within the gay nightlife like "Fruit Machine" and "Fruit Packers" have been appropriated for reclaiming usage, similar to queer.
British slang is English-language slang originating from and used in the United Kingdom and also used to a limited extent in Anglophone countries such as India, Malaysia, Ireland, South Africa, Australia, Canada, and New Zealand, especially by British expatriates. It is also used in the United States to a limited extent. Slang is informal language sometimes peculiar to a particular social class or group and its use in Britain dates back to before the 15th century. The language of slang, in common with the English language, is changing all the time; new words and phrases are being added and some are used so frequently by so many, they almost become mainstream.
"Shut up" is a direct command with a meaning very similar to "be quiet", but which is commonly perceived as a more forceful command to stop making noise or otherwise communicating, such as talking. The phrase is probably a shortened form of "shut up your mouth" or "shut your mouth up". Its use is generally considered rude and impolite, and may also be considered a form of profanity by some.
Prick is a vulgar word for 'penis' as well as a pejorative term used to refer to a despicable or contemptible individual. It is generally considered offensive, though in the past it has been used as a term of endearment. Its history as a euphemism for 'penis' goes back to the 1500s and has been used in wordplay by Shakespeare and other writers who have combined the vulgarism with the standard meaning of the noun, which means the act of piercing or puncturing. Most linguists believe it has been used as a direct insult only since 1929.
"A load of old cobblers" and variants such as "what a load of cobblers" or just "cobblers!" is British slang for "what nonsense" that is derived from the Cockney rhyming slang for "balls" (testicles), which rhymes with "cobbler's awls". The phrase began to be widely used from the 1960s and is still in use but has become less offensive over time as its origins have been forgotten.
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