Jockey.--Tool.--Cove or Covey.--Hook, Hookey, and Walker, Hocus, Hanky-
Panky, and Hocus-Pocus.--Shindy.--Row.--Chivvy.--Bunged Eye.--Shavers.--
Clichy.--Caliban.--A Rum 'un.--Pal.--Trash.--Cadger.--Cad.--Bosh.--Bats.--
Chee-chee.--The Cheese.--Chiv Fencer.--Cooter.--Gorger.--Dick.--Dook.--
Tanner.--Drum.--Gibberish.--Ken.--Lil.--Loure.--Loafer.--Maunder.--Moke.--
Parny.--Posh.--Queer. Raclan.--Bivvy.--Rigs.--Moll.--Distarabin.--Tiny.--
Toffer.--Tool.--Punch.--Wardo.--Voker (one of Mr Hotten's Gipsy words).--
Welcher.--Yack.--Lushy.--A Mull.--Pross.--Toshers.--Up to Trap.--Barney.--
Beebee.--Cull, Culley.--Jomer.--Bloke.--Duffer.--Niggling.--Mug.--
Bamboozle, Slang, and Bite.--Rules to be observed in determining the
Etymology of Gipsy Words.
Though the language of the Gipsies has been kept a great secret for
centuries, still a few words have in England oozed out here and there
from some unguarded crevice, and become a portion of our tongue. There
is, it must be admitted, a great difficulty in tracing, with anything
like accuracy, the real origin or identity of such expressions. Some of
them came into English centuries ago, and during that time great changes
have taken place in Rommany. At least one-third of the words now used by
Scottish Gipsies are unintelligible to their English brothers. To
satisfy myself on this point, I have examined an intelligent English
Gipsy on the Scottish Gipsy vocabularies in Mr Simpson's work, and found
it was as I anticipated; a statement which will not appear incredible
when it is remembered, that even the Rommany of Yetholm have a dialect
marked and distinct from that of other Scotch Gipsies. As for England,
numbers of the words collected by William Marsden, and Jacob Bryant, in
1784-5, Dr Bright in 1817, and by Harriott in 1830, are not known at the
present day to any Gipsies whom I have met. Again, it should be
remembered that the pronunciation of Rommany differs widely with
individuals; thus the word which is given as _cumbo_, a hill, by Bryant,
I have heard very distinctly pronounced _choomure_.
I believe that to Mr Borrow is due the discovery that the word JOCKEY is
of Gipsy origin, and derived from _chuckni_, which means a whip. For
nothing is more clearly established than that the jockey-whip was the
original term in which this word first made its appearance on the turf,
and that the _chuckni_ was a peculiar form of whip, very long and heavy,
first used by the Gipsies. "Jockeyism," says Mr Borrow, "properly means
_the management of a whip_, and the word jockey is neither more nor less
than the term, slightly modified, by which they designate the formidable
whips which they usually carry, and which are at present in general use
among horse-traffickers, under the title of jockey-whips." In Hungary
and Germany the word occurs as _tschuckini_ or _chookni_, and _tschupni_.
Many of my readers are doubtless familiar with the word to TOOL as
applied to dexterously managing the reins and driving horses. 'To tool
the horses down the road,' is indeed rather a fine word of its class,
being as much used in certain clubs as in stables, and often denotes
stylish and gentlemanly driving. And the term is without the slightest
modification, either of pronunciation or meaning, directly and simply
Gipsy, and is used by Gipsies in the same way. It has, however, in
Rommany, as a primitive meaning--to hold, or to take. Thus I have heard
of a feeble old fellow that "he could not tool himself togetherus"--for
which last word, by the way, _kettenus_ might have been more correctly
substituted.
COVE is not an elegant, though a very old, word, but it is well known,
and I have no doubt as to its having come from the Gipsy. In Rommany,
all the world over, _cova_ means "a thing," but it is almost indefinite
in its applicability. "It is," says Pott, "a general helper on all
occasions; is used as substantive and adjective, and has a far wider
scope than the Latin _res_." Thus _covo_ may mean "that man;" _covi_,
"that woman;" and _covo_ or _cuvvo_, as it very often does in English,
"that, there." It sometimes appears in the word _acovat_, or _this_.
There is no expression more frequent in a Gipsy's mouth, and it is
precisely the one which would be probably overheard by "Gorgios" and
applied to persons. I believe that it first made its appearance in
English slang as _covey_, and was then pronounced _cuvvy_, being
subsequently abbreviated into cove.
Quite a little family of words has come into English from the Rommany,
_Hocben_, _huckaben_, _hokkeny_, or _hooker_, all meaning a lie, or to
lie, deception and _humbug_. Mr Borrow shows us that _hocus_, to
"bewitch" liquor with an opiate, and _hoax_, are probably Rommany from
this root, and I have no doubt that the expression, "Yes, with a _hook_,"
meaning "it is false," comes from the same. The well-known "Hookey" who
corresponds so closely with his untruthful and disreputable pal "Walker,"
is decidedly of the streets--gipsy. In German Gipsy we find _chochavav_
and _hochewawa_, and in Roumanian Gipsy _kokao_--a lie. Hanky-panky and
Hocus-pocus are each one half almost pure Hindustani. {81}
A SHINDY approaches so nearly in sound to the Gipsy word _chingaree_,
which means precisely the same thing, that the suggestion is at least
worth consideration. And it also greatly resembles _chindi_, which may
be translated as "cutting up," and also quarrel. "To cut up shindies"
was the first form in which this extraordinary word reached the public.
In the original Gipsy tongue the word to quarrel is _chinger-av_, meaning
also (Pott, _Zigeuner_, p. 209) to cut, hew, and fight, while to cut is
_chinav_. "Cutting up" is, if the reader reflects, a very unmeaning word
as applied to outrageous or noisy pranks; but in Gipsy, whether English,
German, or Oriental, it is perfectly sensible and logical, involving the
idea of quarrelling, separating, dividing, cutting, and stabbing. What,
indeed, could be more absurd than the expression "cutting up shines,"
unless we attribute to _shine_ its legitimate Gipsy meaning of _a piece
cut off_, and its cognate meaning, a noise?
I can see but little reason for saying that a man _cut away_ or that he
_shinned_ it, for run away, unless we have recourse to Gipsy, though I
only offer this as a mere suggestion.
"Applico" to shindy we have the word ROW, meaning nearly the same thing
and as nearly Gipsy in every respect as can be. It is in Gipsy at the
present day in England, correctly, _rov_, or _roven_--to cry--but _v_ and
_w_ are so frequently transposed that we may consider them as the same
letter. _Raw_ or _me rauaw_, "I howl" or "cry," is German Gipsy. _Rowan_
is given by Pott as equivalent to the Latin _ululatus_, which constituted
a very respectable _row_ as regards mere noise. "Rowdy" comes from "row"
and both are very good Gipsy in their origin. In Hindustani _Rao mut_ is
"don't cry!"
CHIVVY is a common English vulgar word, meaning to goad, drive, vex,
hunt, or throw as it were here and there. It is purely Gipsy, and seems
to have more than one root. _Chiv_, _chib_, or _chipe_, in Rommany, mean
a tongue, inferring scolding, and _chiv_ anything sharp-pointed, as for
instance a dagger, or goad or knife. But the old Gipsy word _chiv-av_
among its numerous meanings has exactly that of casting, throwing,
pitching, and driving. To _chiv_ in English Gipsy means as much and more
than to _fix_ in America, in fact, it is applied to almost any kind of
action.
It may be remarked in this connection, that in German or continental
Gipsy, which represents the English in a great measure as it once was,
and which is far more perfect as to grammar, we find different words,
which in English have become blended into one. Thus, _chib_ or _chiv_, a
tongue, and _tschiwawa_ (or _chiv_-ava), to lay, place, lean, sow, sink,
set upright, move, harness, cover up, are united in England into _chiv_,
which embraces the whole. "_Chiv it apre_" may be applied to throwing
anything, to covering it up, to lifting it, to setting it, to pushing it,
to circulating, and in fact to a very great number of similar verbs.
There is, I think, no rational connection between the BUNG of a barrel
and an eye which has been closed by a blow. One might as well get the
simile from a knot in a tree or a cork in a flask. But when we reflect
on the constant mingling of Gipsies with prizefighters, it is almost
evident that the word BONGO may have been the origin of it. A _bongo
yakko_ or _yak_, means a distorted, crooked, or, in fact, a bunged eye.
It also means lame, crooked, or sinister, and by a very singular figure
of speech, _Bongo Tem_ or the Crooked Land is the name for hell. {83}
SHAVERS, as a quaint nick-name for children, is possibly inexplicable,
unless we resort to Gipsy, where we find it used as directly as possible.
_Chavo_ is the Rommany word for child all the world over, and the English
term _chavies_, in Scottish Gipsy _shavies_, or shavers, leaves us but
little room for doubt. I am not aware to what extent the term "little
shavers" is applied to children in England, but in America it is as
common as any cant word can be.
I do not know the origin of the French word CLICHY, as applied to the
noted prison of that name, but it is perhaps not undeserving the comment
that in Continental Gipsy it means a key and a bolt.
I have been struck with the fact that CALIBAN, the monster in "The
Tempest," by Shakespeare, has an appellation which literally signifies
blackness in Gipsy. In fact, this very word, or Cauliban, is given in
one of the Gipsy vocabularies for "black." Kaulopen or Kauloben would,
however, be more correct.
"A regular RUM 'un" was the form in which the application of the word
"rum" to strange, difficult, or distinguished, was first introduced to
the British public. This, I honestly believe (as Mr Borrow indicates),
came from _Rum_ or _Rom_, a Gipsy. It is a peculiar word, and all of its
peculiarities might well be assumed by the sporting Gipsy, who is always,
in his way, a character, gifted with an indescribable self-confidence, as
are all "horsey" men characters, "sports" and boxers, which enables them
to keep to perfection the German eleventh commandment, "Thou shall not
let thyself be _bluffed_!"--_i.e_., abashed.
PAL is a common cant word for brother or friend, and it is purely Gipsy,
having come directly from that language, without the slightest change. On
the Continent it is _prala_, or _pral_. In England it sometimes takes
the form "_pel_."
TRASH is derived by Mr Wedgwood (Dictionary of English Etymology, 1872)
from the old word _trousse_, signifying the clipping of trees. But in
old Gipsy or in the German Gipsy of the present day, as in the Turkish
Rommany, it means so directly "fear, mental weakness and worthlessness,"
that it may possibly have had a Rommany origin. Terror in Gipsy is
_trash_, while thirst is _trush_, and both are to be found in the
Hindustani. _Tras_, which means _thirst_ and _alarm_ or _terror_.
It should be observed that in no instance can these Gipsy words have been
borrowed from English slang. They are all to be found in German Gipsy,
which is in its turn identical with the Rommany language of India--of the
Nats, Bhazeghurs, Doms, Multanee or Banjoree, as I find the primitive
wandering Gipsies termed by different writers.
I am aware that the word CAD was applied to the conductor of an omnibus,
or to a non-student at Universities, before it became a synonym for
vulgar fellow, yet I believe that it was abbreviated from cadger, and
that this is simply the Gipsy word Gorgio, which often means a man in the
abstract. I have seen this word printed as gorger in English slang.
CODGER, which is common, is applied, as Gipsies use the term Gorgio,
contemptuously, and it sounds still more like it.
BOSH, signifying nothing, or in fact empty humbug, is generally credited
to the Turkish language, but I can see no reason for going to the Turks
for what the Gipsies at home already had, in all probability, from the
same Persian source, or else from the Sanskrit. With the Gipsies, _bosh_
is a fiddle, music, noise, barking, and very often an idle sound or
nonsense. "Stop your bosherin," or "your bosh," is what they would term
_flickin lav_, or current phrase.
"BATS," a low term for a pair of boots, especially bad ones, is, I think,
from the Gipsy and Hindustani _pat_, a foot, generally called, however,
by the Rommany in England, Tom Pats. "To pad the hoof," and "to stand
pad "--the latter phrase meaning to stand upright, or to stand and beg,
are probably derived from _pat_. It should be borne in mind that
Gipsies, in all countries, are in the habit of changing certain letters,
so that _p_ and _b_, like _l_ and _n_, or _k_ and _g_ hard, may often be
regarded as identical.
"CHEE-CHEE," "be silent!" or "fie," is termed "Anglo-Indian," by the
author of the Slang Dictionary, but we need not go to India of the
present day for a term which is familiar to every Gipsy and "traveller"
in England, and which, as Mr Simson discovered long ago, is an excellent
"spell" to discourage the advances of thimble-riggers and similar gentry,
at fairs, or in public places.
CHEESE, or "THE CHEESE," meaning that anything is pre-eminent or
superior; in fact, "the thing," is supposed by many to be of gipsy origin
because Gipsies use it, and it is to be found as "chiz" in Hindustani, in
which language it means a thing. Gipsies do not, however, seem to regard
it themselves, as _tacho_ or true Rommanis, despite this testimony, and I
am inclined to think that it partly originated in some wag's perversion
of the French word _chose_.
In London, a man who sells cutlery in the streets is called a CHIVE
FENCER, a term evidently derived from the Gipsy _chiv_, a sharp-pointed
instrument or knife. A knife is also called a _chiv_ by the lowest class
all over England.
COUTER or COOTER is a common English slang term for a guinea. It was not
necessary for the author of the Slang Dictionary to go to the banks of
the Danube for the origin of a word which is in the mouths of all English
Gipsies, and which was brought to England by their ancestors. A
sovereign, a pound, in Gipsy, is a _bar_.
A GORGER, meaning a gentleman, or well-dressed man, and in theatrical
parlance, a manager, is derived by the author of the Slang
Dictionary--absurdly enough, it must be confessed--from "gorgeous,"--a
word with which it has no more in common than with gouges or chisels. A
gorger or gorgio--the two are often confounded--is the common Gipsy word
for one who is not Gipsy, and very often means with them a _rye_ or
gentleman, and indeed any man whatever. Actors sometimes call a fellow-
performer a _cully-gorger_.
DICK, an English slang word for sight, or seeing, is purely Gipsy in its
origin, and in common use by Rommanis over all the world.
DOOK, to tell fortunes, and DOOKING, fortune-telling, are derived by the
writer last cited, correctly enough, from the Gipsy _dukkerin_,--a fact
which I specify, since it is one of the very rare instances in which he
has not blundered when commenting on Rommany words, or other persons'
works.
Mr Borrow has told us that a TANNER or sixpence, sometimes called a
Downer, owes its pseudonym to the Gipsy word _tawno_ or _tano_, meaning
"little"--the sixpence being the little coin as compared with a shilling.
DRUM or DROM, is the common English Gipsy word for a road. In English
slang it is applied, not only to highways, but also to houses.
If the word GIBBERISH was, as has been asserted, first applied to the
language of the Gipsies, it may have been derived either from "Gip," the
nickname for Gipsy, with _ish_ or _rish_ appended as in Engl-_ish_, I-
_rish_, or from the Rommany word _Jib_ signifying a language.
KEN, a low term for a house, is possibly of Gipsy origin. The common
word in every Rommany dialect for a house is, however, neither ken nor
khan, but _Ker_.
LIL, a book, a letter, has passed from the Gipsies to the low "Gorgios,"
though it is not a very common word. In Rommany it can be _correctly_
applied only to a letter or a piece of paper, which is written on, though
English Gipsies call all books by this name, and often speak of a letter
as a _Chinamangri_.
LOUR or LOWR, and LOAVER, are all vulgar terms for money, and combine two
Gipsy words, the one _lovo_ or _lovey_, and the other _loure_, to steal.
The reason for the combination or confusion is obvious. The author of
the Slang Dictionary, in order to explain this word, goes as usual to the
Wallachian Gipsies, for what he might have learned from the first tinker
in the streets of London. I should remark on the word loure, that Mr
Borrow has shown its original identity with _loot_, the Hindustani for
plunder or booty.
I believe that the American word loafer owes something to this Gipsy
root, as well as to the German _laufer_ (_landlaufer_), and Mexican
Spanish _galeofar_, and for this reason, that when the term first began
to be popular in 1834 or 1835, I can distinctly remember that it meant to
_pilfer_. Such, at least, is my earliest recollection, and of hearing
school boys ask one another in jest, of their acquisitions or gifts,
"Where did you loaf that from?" A petty pilferer was a loafer, but in a
very short time all of the tribe of loungers in the sun, and disreputable
pickers up of unconsidered trifles, now known as bummers, were called
loafers. On this point my memory is positive, and I call attention to
it, since the word in question has been the subject of much conjecture in
America.
It is a very curious fact, that while the word _loot_ is unquestionably
Anglo-Indian, and only a recent importation into our English "slanguage,"
it has always been at the same time English-Gipsy, although it never rose
to the surface.
MAUNDER, to stroll about and beg, has been derived from _Mand_, the Anglo-
Saxon for a basket, but is quite as likely to have come from Maunder, the
Gipsy for "to beg." Mumper, a beggar, is also from the same source.
MOKE, a donkey, is _said_ to be Gipsy, by Mr Hotten, but Gipsies
themselves do not use the word, nor does it belong to their usual
language. The proper Rommany word for an ass is _myla_.
PARNY, a vulgar word for rain, is supposed to have come into England from
the "Anglo-Indian" source, but it is more likely that it was derived from
the Gipsy _panni_ or water. "Brandy pawnee" is undoubtedly an
Anglo-Indian word, but it is used by a very different class of people
from those who know the meaning of _Parny_.
POSH, which has found its way into vulgar popularity, as a term for small
coins, and sometimes for money in general, is the diminutive of the Gipsy
word _pashero_ or _poshero_, a half-penny, from _pash_ a half, and
_haura_ or _harra_, a penny.
QUEER, meaning across, cross, contradictory, or bad, is "supposed" to be
the German word _quer_, introduced by the Gipsies. In their own language
_atut_ means across or against, though to _curry_ (German and Turkish
Gipsy _kurava_), has some of the slang meaning attributed to _queer_. An
English rogue will say, "to shove the queer," meaning to pass counterfeit
money, while the Gipsy term would be to _chiv wafri lovvo_, or _lovey_.
"RAGLAN, a married woman, originally _Gipsy_, but now a term with English
tramps" (_The Slang Dictionary_, _London_ 1865). In Gipsy, _raklo_ is a
youth or boy, and _rakli_, a girl; Arabic, _ragol_, a man. I am
informed, on good authority, that these words are known in India, though
I cannot find them in dictionaries. They are possibly transposed from
_Lurka_ a youth and _lurki_ a girl, such transpositions being common
among the lowest classes in India.
RUMMY or RUMY, as applied to women, is simply the Gipsy word _romi_, a
contraction of _romni_, a wife; the husband being her _rom_.
BIVVY for beer, has been derived from the Italian _bevere_, but it is
probably Gipsy, since in the old form of the latter language, Biava or
Piava, means to drink. To _pivit_, is still known among English Gipsies.
RIGS--running one's rigs is said to be Gipsy, but the only meaning of
_rig_, so far as I am able to ascertain in Rommany, is _a side_ or _an
edge_. It is, however, possible that one's _side_ may in earlier times
have been equivalent to "face, or encounter." To _rikker_ or _rigger_ in
Gipsy, is to carry anything.
MOLL, a female companion, is probably merely the nickname for Mary, but
it is worth observing, that _Mal_ in old Gipsy, or in German Gipsy, means
an associate, and Mahar a wife, in Hindustani.
STASH, to be quiet, to stop, is, I think, a variation of the common Gipsy
word hatch, which means precisely the same thing, and is derived from the
older word _atchava_.
STURABAN, a prison, is purely Gipsy. Mr Hotten says it is from the Gipsy
_distarabin_, but there is no such word beginning with _dis_, in the
English Rommany dialect. In German Gipsy a prison is called
_stillapenn_.
TINY or TEENY has been derived from the Gipsy _tano_, meaning "little."
TOFFER, a woman who is well dressed in new clean clothes, probably gets
the name from the Gipsy _tove_, to wash (German Gipsy _Tovava_). She is,
so to speak, freshly washed. To this class belong Toff, a dandy;
_Tofficky_, dressy or gay, and _Toft_, a dandy or swell.
TOOL as applied to stealing, picking pockets, and burglary, is, like
_tool_, to drive with the reins; derived beyond doubt from the Gipsy word
_tool_, to take or hold. In all the Continental Rommany dialects it is
_Tulliwawa_.
PUNCH, it is generally thought, is Anglo-Indian, derived directly from
the Hindustani _Pantch_ or five, from the five ingredients which enter
into its composition, but it may have partially got its name from some
sporting Gipsy in whose language the word for _five_ is the same as in
Sanskrit. There have been thousands of "swell" Rommany chals who have
moved in sporting circles of a higher class than they are to be found in
at the present day.
"VARDO formerly was _Old Cant_ for a waggon" (_The Slang Dictionary_). It
may be added that it is pure Gipsy, and is still known at the present day
to every Rom in England. In Turkish Gipsy, _Vordon_ means a vehicle, in
German Gipsy, _Wortin_.
"Can you VOKER Rommany?" is given by Mr Hotten as meaning "Can you speak
Gipsy,"--but there is no such word in Rommany as _voker_. He probably
meant "Can you _rakker_"--pronounced very often _Roker_. Continental
Gipsy _Rakkervava_. Mr Hotten derives it from the Latin _Vocare_!
I do not know the origin of WELCHER, a betting cheat, but it is worthy of
remark that in old Gipsy a _Walshdo_ or Welsher meant a Frenchman (from
the German Walsch) or any foreigner of the Latin races.
YACK, a watch, probably received its name from the Gipsy _Yak_ an eye, in
the old times when watches were called bull's eyes.
LUSHY, to be tipsy, and LUSH, are attributed for their origin to the name
of Lushington, a once well-known London brewer, but when we find _Losho_
and _Loshano_ in a Gipsy dialect, meaning jolly, from such a Sanskrit
root as _Lush_; as Paspati derives it, there seems to be some ground for
supposing the words to be purely Rommany. Dr Johnson said of lush that
it was "opposite to pale," and this curiously enough shows its first
source, whether as a "slang" word or as indicative of colour, since one
of its early Sanskrit meanings is _light_ or _radiance_. This identity
of the so regarded vulgar and the refined, continually confronts us in
studying Rommany.
"To make a MULL of anything," meaning thereby to spoil or confuse it, if
it be derived, as is said, from the Gipsy, must have come from _Mullo_
meaning _dead_, and the Sanskrit _Mara_. There is, however, no such
Gipsy word as mull, in the sense of entangling or spoiling.
PROSS is a theatrical slang word, meaning to instruct and train a tyro.
As there are several stage words of manifest Gipsy origin, I am inclined
to derive this from the old Gipsy _Priss_, to read. In English Gipsy
_Prasser_ or _Pross_ means to ridicule or scorn. Something of this is
implied in the slang word _Pross_, since it also means "to sponge upon a
comrade," &c., "for drink."
TOSHERS are in English low language, "men who steal copper from ship's
bottoms." I cannot form any direct connection between this word and any
in English Gipsy, but it is curious that in Turkish Gipsy _Tasi_ is a
cup, and in Turkish Persian it means, according to Paspati, a copper
basin used in the baths. It is as characteristic of English Gipsy as of
any of its cognate dialects, that we often find lurking in it the most
remarkable Oriental fragments, which cannot be directly traced through
the regular line of transmission.
UP TO TRAP means, in common slang, intelligent. It is worth observing,
that in Gipsy, _drab_ or _trap_ (which words were pronounced alike by the
first Gipsies who came from Germany to England), is used for medicine or
poison, and the employment of the latter is regarded, even at the
present, as the greatest Rommany secret. Indeed, it is only a few days
since a Gipsy said to me, "If you know _drab_, you're up to everything;
for there's nothing goes above that." With _drab_ the Gipsy secures
game, fish, pigs, and poultry; he quiets kicking horses until they can be
sold; and last, not least, kills or catches rats and mice. As with the
Indians of North America, _medicine_--whether to kill or cure--is to the
Gipsy the art of arts, and those who affect a knowledge of it are always
regarded as the most intelligent. It is, however, remarkable, that the
Gipsy, though he lives in fields and woods, is, all the world over, far
inferior to the American Indian as regards a knowledge of the properties
of herbs or minerals. One may pick the first fifty plants which he sees
in the woods, and show them to the first Indian whom he meets, with the
absolute certainty that the latter will give him a name for every one,
and describe in detail their qualities and their use as remedies. The
Gipsy seldom has a name for anything of the kind. The country people in
America, and even the farmers' boys, have probably inherited by tradition
much of this knowledge from the aborigines.
BARNEY, a mob or crowd, may be derived from the Gipsy _baro_, great or
many, which sometimes takes the form of _barno_ or _barni_, and which
suggests the Hindustani Bahrna "to increase, proceed, to gain, to be
promoted;" and Bharna, "to fill, to satisfy, to be filled, &c."--(Brice's
"Hindustani and English Dictionary." London, Trubner & Co., 1864).
BEEBEE, which the author of the Slang Dictionary declares means a lady,
and is "Anglo-Indian," is in general use among English Gipsies for aunt.
It is also a respectful form of address to any middle-aged woman, among
friends.
CULL or CULLY, meaning a man or boy, in Old English cant, is certainly of
Gipsy origin. _Chulai_ signifies man in Spanish Gipsy (Borrow), and
_Khulai_ a gentleman, according to Paspati; in Turkish Rommany--a
distinction which the word _cully_ often preserves in England, even when
used in a derogatory sense, as of a dupe.
JOMER, a sweetheart or female favourite, has probably some connection in
derivation with choomer, a kiss, in Gipsy.
BLOKE, a common coarse word for a man, may be of Gipsy origin; since, as
the author of the Slang Dictionary declares, it may be found in
Hindustani, as Loke. "_Lok_, people, a world, region."--("Brice's Hind.
Dictionary.") _Bala' lok_, a gentleman.
A DUFFER, which is an old English cant term, expressive of contempt for a
man, may be derived from the Gipsy _Adovo_, "that," "that man," or "that
fellow there." _Adovo_ is frequently pronounced almost like "a duffer,"
or "_a duvva_."
NIGGLING, which means idling, wasting time, doing anything slowly, may be
derived from some other Indo-European source, but in English Gipsy it
means to go slowly, "to potter along," and in fact it is the same as the
English word. That it is pure old Rommany appears from the fact that it
is to be found as _Niglavava_ in Turkish Gipsy, meaning "I go," which is
also found in _Nikliovava_ and _Nikavava_, which are in turn probably
derived from the Hindustani _Nikalna_, "To issue, to go forth or out,"
&c. (Brice, Hind. Dic.) _Niggle_ is one of the English Gipsy words
which are used in the East, but which I have not been able to find in the
German Rommany, proving that here, as in other countries, certain old
forms have been preserved, though they have been lost where the
vocabulary is far more copious, and the grammar much more perfect.
MUG, a face, is derived by Mr Wedgwood from the Italian MOCCA, a mocking
or apish mouth (Dictionary of English Etymology), but in English Gipsy we
have not only _mui_, meaning the face, but the _older_ forms from which
the English word was probably taken, such as Mak'h (Paspati), and finally
the Hindustani _Mook_ and the Sanskrit _Mukha_, mouth or face
(Shakespeare, Hind. Dic., p. 745). In all cases where a word is so
"slangy" as mug, it seems more likely that it should have been derived
from Rommany than from Italian, since it is only within a few years that
any considerable number of the words of the latter language was imparted
to the lower classes of London.
BAMBOOZLE, BITE, and SLANG are all declared by the author of the Slang
Dictionary to be Gipsy, but, with the exception of the last word, I am
unable to verify their Rommany origin. Bambhorna does indeed mean in
Hindustani (Brice), "to bite or to worry," and bamboo-bakshish to deceive
by paying with a whipping, while _swang_, as signifying mimicking,
acting, disguise and sham, whether of words or deeds, very curiously
conveys the spirit of the word slang. As for _bite_ I almost hesitate to
suggest the possibility of a connection between it and _Bidorna_, to
laugh at. I offer not only these three suggested derivations, but also
most of the others, with every reservation. For many of these words, as
for instance _bite_, etymologists have already suggested far more
plausible and more probable derivations, and if I have found a place for
Rommany "roots," it is simply because what is the most plausible, and
apparently the most probable, is not always the true origin. But as I
firmly believe that there is much more Gipsy in English, especially in
English slang and cant, than the world is aware of, I think it advisable
to suggest what I can, leaving to abler philologists the task of testing
its value.
Writers on such subjects err, almost without an exception, in insisting
on one accurately defined and singly derived source for every word, when
perhaps three or four have combined to form it. The habits of thought
and methods of study followed by philologists render them especially open
to this charge. They wish to establish every form as symmetrical and
mathematical, where nature has been freakish and bizarre. Some years ago
when I published certain poems in the broken English spoken by Germans,
an American philologist, named Haldemann, demonstrated to his own
satisfaction that the language which I had put into Hans Breitmann's
mouth was inaccurate, because I had not reduced it to an uniform dialect,
making the same word the same in spelling and pronunciation on all
occasions, when the most accurate observation had convinced me, as it
must any one, that those who have only partially learned a language
continually vary their methods of uttering its words.
That some words have come from one source and been aided by another, is
continually apparent in English Gipsy, as for instance in the word for
reins, "guiders," which, until the Rommany reached England, was voidas.
In this instance the resemblance in sound between the words undoubtedly
conduced to an union. Gibberish may have come from the Gipsy, and at the
same time owe something to _gabble_, _jabber_, and the old Norse or
Icelandic _gifra_. _Lush_ may owe something to Mr Lushington, something
to the earlier English _lush_, or rosy, and something to the Gipsy and
Sanskrit. It is not at all unlikely that the word _codger_ owes, through
_cadger_, a part of its being to _kid_, a basket, as Mr Halliwell
suggests (Dictionary of Archaic and Provincial Words, 1852), and yet come
quite as directly from _gorger_ or _gorgio_. "The cheese" probably has
the Gipsy-Hidustani _chiz_ for a father, and the French _chose_ for a
mother, while both originally sprung thousands of years ago in the great
parting of the Aryan nations, to be united after so long a separation in
a distant island in the far northern seas.
The etymologist who hesitates to adopt this principle of joint sources of
derivation, will find abundant instances of something very like it in
many English Gipsy words themselves, which, as belonging to a language in
extreme decay, have been formed directly from different, but somewhat
similarly sounding, words, in the parent German or Eastern Rommany. Thus,
_schukker_, pretty; _bi-shukker_, slow; _tschukko_, dry, and
_tschororanes_, secretly, have in England all united in _shukar_, which
expresses all of their meanings.