tea

en-noun

tea (countable and uncountable, plural teas)

Gullah: tea

Jamaican Creole: tea

→ Abenaki: ti

→ Chickasaw: tii'

→ Cocopa: ṭi·

→ Cornish: té

→ Cree:

Canadian syllabic script: ᑎᕀ (tiy)

Latin script: tiy

→ Inuktitut: ᑏ (tii)

→ Irish: tae

→ Maori: tī

→ Malecite-Passamaquoddy: ti

desc

→ Mikasuki: ti'g'tlo'q, ji'gitlo'q (“kettle”) (from "tea kettle")

→ Panamint: tii

→ Scottish Gaelic: tì, teatha

→ Tamil: டீ (ṭī)

→ Tashelhit: atay

→ Telugu: టీ (ṭī)

→ Unami: ti

→ Welsh: te

Amoy
Amoy dialect
Dutch East India Company
Macao
Álvaro Semedo

First appears c. 1655, in the writings of Álvaro Semedo. From Dutch thee, from Hokkien 茶 (tê) (Amoy dialect), from Old Chinese, ultimately from Proto-Sino-Tibetan *s-la (“leaf, tea”). Introduced to English and other Western European languages by the Dutch East India Company, who sourced their tea in Amoy; compare Malay teh along the same trade route. Doublet of chai and cha (and, distantly, the first element of lahpet), from same Proto-Sino-Tibetan root; see discussion of cognates.
Cognates
The word for “tea” in many languages is of Sinitic origin (due to China being the origin of the plant), and thus there are many cognates; see translations. These are from one of two proximate sources, reflected in the phonological shape: forms with a stop (e.g. /t/) are derived from Min Nan tê, while forms with an affricate (e.g. /tʃ/) are derived from other Sinitic languages, like Mandarin chá or Cantonese caa4 (all written as 茶). Different languages borrowed one or the other form (specific language and point in time varied), reflecting trade ties, generally Min Nan tê if by ocean trade from Fujian, Cantonese caa4 if by ocean trade from Guangdong, or northern Chinese chá if by overland trade or by ocean trade from India.
Thus Western and Northern European languages borrowed tê (with the exception of Portuguese, which uses chá; despite being by ocean trade, their source was in Macao, not Amoy), while chá borrowings are used over a very large geographical area of Eurasia and Africa: Southern and Eastern Europe, and on through Turkish, Arabic, North and East Africa, Persian, Central Asian, and Indic languages. In Europe the tê/chá line is Italian/Slovene, Hungarian/Romanian, German/Czech, Polish/Ukrainian, Baltics/Russian, Finnish/Karelian, Northern Sami/Inari Sami. tê was also borrowed in European trade stops in Southern India and coastal Africa, though chá borrowings are otherwise more prevalent in these regions, via Arabic or Indic, due to earlier trade. The situation in Southeast Asia is complex due to multiple influences, and some languages borrowed both forms, such as Malay teh and ca.
Sense 10 (“information, especially gossip”) is originally from T standing for truth, which evolved into tea.

茶水

cheap or free tea in Chinese restaurants

紅茶 (こうちゃ, kōcha) (black tea, lit.: "red")

what does that have to do with the price of tea in China

The family were sitting round the table, eating their tea.

Jacki set about making the tea—bacon grills with chips and bread and butter.

2018, Ray Wyre, Tim Tate, The Murder of Childhood, page 126:

(uncountable, Commonwealth, Ireland) Synonym of supper, the main evening meal, whether or not it includes tea.


cos

Taking the shortcut through the alleyway by the Jobcentre Plus, just cos I can, we arrive at my flat within minutes.

2021, Isabel Waidner, Sterling Karat Gold, Peninsula Press, page 161:

(UK, Ireland, South Africa, African-American Vernacular) Informal spelling of 'cause (“because”).


proper

From Middle English propre, from Anglo-Norman proper, propre, Old French propre (French: propre), from Latin proprius.

propa (alternative Geordie)
propre (alternative obsolete)

'I thought it was the American Associated Press.' 'Oh, they are on the track, are they?' 'They to-day, and the Times yesterday. Oh, they are buzzing round proper.'

1929, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, When the World Screamed:

“Christmas Eve,” said Nabby Adams. “I used to pump the bloody organ for the carols, proper pissed usually.”

1956, Anthony Burgess, Time for a Tiger (The Malayan Trilogy), published 1972, page 202:

The kid towelled him up proper.

1957, Ray Lawler, Summer of the Seventeenth Doll, Sydney: Fontana Books, published 1974, page 32:

Don't you think you must have looked proper daft?

1964, Saint Andrew Society (Glasgow, Scotland), The Scots magazine: Volume 82

(UK, Ireland, colloquial) properly; thoroughly; completely.


producer

→ Azerbaijani: prodüser

→ Danish: producer

→ Dutch: producer

→ Hungarian: producer

→ Japanese: プロデューサー (purodyūsā)

desctree

→ Russian: продю́сер (prodjúser)
→ Kazakh: продюсер (prodüser)

/pɹəˈdʒuːsə/

(UK, Ireland, slang) An arrest for speeding after which the driver is allowed seven (in the UK) or ten (in Ireland) days to produce his/her driving licence and related documents at a police station.


reference

en-noun

reference (countable and uncountable, plural references)

From Middle French référence, from Medieval Latin referentia, nominative neuter plural of referēns, present participle of referō (“return, reply”, literally “carry back”). Morphologically refer + -ence.

verwysing

academic writing: identification of a source

(UK, Ireland) A person who provides this information; a referee.


da

From child language; compare dad and dada.

Oh where is yer da son? The man said it to me and was grumpy. Is yer da here?

2008, James Kelman, Kieron Smith, Boy, Penguin 2009, page 55:

Once the silky gent who ran a barge called the Knuckle Sandwich tried to persuade Borglum's ma and da to sell him their little dwarfish boy for twelve gold coins.

2011, Philip Reeve, Scrivener's Moon, Scholastic, →ISBN, page 48:

(Ireland, Scotland, Northern England) Father.


course

→ Gulf Arabic: كورس (kōrs)

From Middle English cours, from Old French cours, from Latin cursus (“course of a race”), from currō (“run”), ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *ḱers- (“to run”). Doublet of cursus and cour.

polku

path that something or someone moves along

the course of true love never did run smooth

What's your course in university?
—Business studies. And you?

During the whole time of his abode in the university he generally spent thirteen hours of the day in study; by which assiduity besides an exact dispatch of the whole course of philosophy, he read over in a manner all classic authors that are extant[…]

1661, John Fell, The Life of the most learned, reverend and pious Dr. H. Hammond:

(UK, Ireland, Philippines) an educational programme at a college or university leading to an academic degree or vocational qualification.


shan't

shalln't (alternative)
sha'n't (alternative)

From shall + -n't; contraction of shalln't or shall not, historically via shannot.

I shan't be coming back after the way you've treated me today.

That's not a threat, sir, for they have played fair with me, and I sha'n't sacrifice a penny of their money—unless they force me to do so. But—I'm in control. I'm sitting pretty. They can't unseat me, and I warn them not to try.

1922, Rex [Ellingwood] Beach, “chapter XXIV”, in Flowing Gold, New York, N.Y.: Grosset & Dunlap Publishers, by arrangement with Harper & Brothers, →OCLC, page 290:

(UK, Ireland, colloquial; archaic in US, Canada; dated in Australia, New Zealand) Contraction of shall not (negative auxiliary).


oughtn't

We ought to wake dad, oughtn't we?

(UK, Ireland, Commonwealth) (US, Philippines, dated, rare) ought not (negative auxiliary).


usedn't to

He usedn’t to live in London.

Usedn't your uncle to live with you?

(Ireland, archaic in British, obsolete elsewhere) used not to, didn't use to


pare

en-verb

pare (third-person singular simple present pares, present participle paring, simple past and past participle pared)

pares (present singular third-person)
paring (participle present)
pared (participle past)
pared (past)

From Middle English paren, from Old French parer (“to arrange, prepare, trim”), from Latin parō (“I prepare, arrange; I provide, furnish; I resolve, purpose”) (related to pariō (“I bear, I give birth to; I spawn, produce, beget; I procure, acquire”)), from a Proto-Indo-European *per- (“to bring forward, bring forth”).


magazine

→ Burmese: မဂ္ဂဇင်း (magga.jang:)

→ Cebuano: magasin

→ Dutch: magazine

→ French: magazine

→ Portuguese: magazine

→ Italian: magazine

→ Gujarati: મેગેઝિન (megejhin)

→ Hebrew: מגזין (magazin)

→ Japanese: マガジン (magajin)

desc

→ Kashubian: magazina (Canada, United States)

→ Shan: မႅၵ်ႈၵၸိၼ်း (mēk kǎ tsín)

→ Shan: မႅၵ်ႈၵၸိၼ်း (mēk kǎ tsín)

→ Spanish: magacín

→ Turkish: magazin

→ Malay: magazin

From Middle English magasyne, from Middle French magasin (“warehouse, store”), from Italian magazzino (“storehouse”), ultimately from Arabic مَخَازِن pl (maḵāzin), plural of مَخْزَن (maḵzan, “storeroom, storehouse”), noun of place from خَزَنَ (ḵazana, “to store, to stock, to lay up”). First attested in the 1580s.

ref

Douglas Harper (2001–2025) “magazine (n.)”, in Online Etymology Dictionary.

etydate

Most teletext "magazines" contain about 100 pages of information, typically including news headlines, weather reports, sports scores, video games, and stock prices.

1983, Channels of Communications, volume 3, page 41:

The operator is able to build Teletext magazines of, typically, 100 pages per magazine, specify transmission times […]

1984, Telecommunications, volume 18, page 89:

(historical, television, UK, Ireland) A collection of Teletext pages.


mug

→ French: mug → French: meugue

→ Finnish: muki

→ Maltese: magg

→ Swedish: mugg

→ Welsh: mẁg, mỳg

Early 16th century (originally Scots and northern English, denoting "earthenware, pot, jug"), of unknown origin, perhaps from North Germanic (compare Swedish mugg (“mug, jug”), Norwegian mugge (“pitcher, open can for warm drinks”), Danish mugge), or Low German mokke, mukke (“mug”), German Low German Muck (“drinking cup”), Dutch mok (“mug”), also of unknown origin. Perhaps related to Old English muga (“stack”) and Old Norse múgr (“mass, heap (of corn)”). Compare also Middle English mug, mog (“a measure of salt”).

cog

(UK, Ireland, Australia, New Zealand, Singapore, Hong Kong, derogatory, slang) A stupid or contemptible person.


mug

en-verb

mug (third-person singular simple present mugs, present participle mugging, simple past and past participle mugged)

mugs (present singular third-person)
mugging (participle present)
mugged (participle past)
mugged (past)

Madgbury showed game, drove Abbot in a corner, but got well Mugg'd.

1857, "The Leary Man", in Anglicus Ducange, The Vulgar Tongue
And if you come to fibbery, You must Mug one or two,

"Suppose they had Mugged you?" / "Done what to me?" / "Mugged you. Slogged you, you know."

1866 May 5, London Miscellany, page 102:

(transitive, obsolete, UK, Ireland) To strike in the face.

(UK, Ireland, Australia, New Zealand, Singapore, Hong Kong, slang) To learn or review a subject as much as possible in a short time; cram.


cot

Borrowed from Hindi खाट (khāṭ), from Sauraseni Prakrit 𑀔𑀝𑁆𑀝𑀸 (khaṭṭā), from Sanskrit खट्वा (khaṭvā, “bedstead”).

(UK, Ireland, Commonwealth) A bed for infants or small children, with high, often slatted, often moveable sides.


muggle

muggle (third-person singular simple present muggles, present participle muggling, simple past and past participle muggled)

muggles (present singular third-person)
muggling (participle present)
muggled (participle past)
muggled (past)

Origin unknown; attested in Berkshire, Devonshire, Gloucestershire, Hampshire, Lancashire, Somersetshire, Staffordshire, the West Country, Wiltshire, and Yorkshire in the United Kingdom. The word is possibly a variant of muddle.

And zo thay muggled along, 'till tha volks all begun to make giame on them.

1872, Agrikler [pseudonym; Joseph Edwards], “Tha Man as Coodent Plaze Nubbody”, in Rhymes in the West of England Dialect. […], 2nd edition, Bristol, Somerset: Leech and Taylor, […], →OCLC, page 39:

I might have a made out to muggle along if so be Mister Jolly would a rised my wages, or the Union could a kept on taken care o' this last poor little un, till sich time as I might a married some'un to keep the childern tidy; [...]

1873, [Edward Jenkins], “Justices’ Justice and Statutes at Large”, in Little Hodge, author’s edition, New York, N.Y.: Dodd & Mead, […], →OCLC, page 102:

She might truly be said "to muggle along;" everything in her house was in the greatest state of confusion, and, it must be added, dirt.

1877 May, [Frances Hariott Wood], “The Old Red School-house”, in W[illiam] Meynell Whittemore, editor, Sunshine for 1877. […], number 185, London: William Poole, […], →OCLC, chapter VI (Widow Lawrence’s Story), page 77, column 2:

He rose to no eminence and got through life somehow, ‘muggled along,’ as Somersetshire people say.

1889, [John Hutton Balfour Browne], “Popular”, in Times and Days: Being Essays in Romance and History, London, New York, N.Y.: Longmans, Green, and Co. […], →OCLC, page 28:

MUGGLE, [...] To muddle along, to live in a muddling, haphazard way.

[1903, “MUGGLE, v.¹ and sb.²”, in Joseph Wright, editor, The English Dialect Dictionary: […], volume IV (M–Q), London: Henry Frowde, […], publisher to the English Dialect Society, […]; New York, N.Y.: G. P. Putnam’s Sons, →OCLC, page 195, column 1:

"He has whiskers and whuskers but no wapers; / He whiffles and whaffles and muggles along;" / Thus ran the headlines of the morning papers; / The reporters all put to sea in a flong.

1934, Margaret, Lady Rhondda, editor, Time and Tide, volume 15, →ISSN, →OCLC, page 1016, column 1:

[T]he tractor struggles and muggles through the overgrown tour path, the tall grass whispers on the bottom of our cage, [...]

2010 October, Paul Tremblay, “Tour: Slipshod Safari”, in We Will Never Live in the Castle, Toronto, Ont.: ChiZine Publications, published April 2013, →ISBN:

(intransitive, UK, Ireland, dialectal) Often followed by along: to live or work in an unorganized and unplanned way; to muddle along.


couch

→ German: Couch

→ Serbo-Croatian: кауч /kauč

From Middle English couche, cowche, from Old French couche, from the verb (see below). Doublet of cwtch.

At a casting workshop, an actor was performing a blank scene […] and he had not bothered to make any choices about why he was on stage, what his motivation was, what he was playing. He had decided who he was and where he was (on a couch with his girlfriend) but had not decided what he wanted. So the performance was flat and lifeless.

2009, Nancy Bishop, Secrets from the Casting Couch: On Camera Strategies for Actors from a Casting Director, London: Methuen Drama, A & C Black, →ISBN:

[…] I want to try to describe my efforts to take psychoanalysis as a method off the couch and into the work of creating and using a political conference table.

2010, Alessandra Lemma, Matthew Patrick, “Off the Couch and Round the Conference Table”, in Alessandra Lemma, Matthew Patrick, editors, Off the Couch: Contemporary Psychoanalytic Applications, London: Routledge, →ISBN:

It's not a particularly unique living room. It has a window that faces the street, two broken-in beige couches, a few end tables, a television (not the latest model), and a dark blue throw rug in the center of it all. Alice sat down on one end of one couch, and I sat down on the other end.

2014, Jennifer Mathieu, The Truth About Alice: A Novel, New York, N.Y.: Roaring Brook Press, →ISBN:

(Canada, US, Australia, Ireland) An item of furniture, often upholstered, for the comfortable seating of more than one person; a sofa.

bank

furniture for seating of more than one person


toad in the hole

en-noun

toad in the hole (countable and uncountable, plural toads in the hole)

toads in the hole (plural)
toad-in-the-hole (alternative)

(UK, Ireland) A traditional English dish of roasted sausages (or formerly other kinds of meat) in batter.

toad in the hole

there's nothing equivalent in Finnish cuisine


loo

A Dictionary of Slang and Unconventional English

Uncertain, although usually derived in some way from Waterloo, the site of Wellington's 1815 victory over Napoleon, likely via a pun based on water closet. Other suggested derivations include corruptions of French l'eau (“water”), lieu (“place”), lieux d'aisances (“'places of convenience': a lavatory”), lieu à l'anglaise (“'English place': a British-style lavatory”), bordalou (“a diminutive chamber pot”) or gardez l'eau (“'mind the water'”), via Scots gardyloo, formerly used in Edinburgh while emptying chamber pots out of windows; the supposed use of "Room 100" as the lavatory in Continental hotels; a popularisation of lew, a regional corruption of lee (“downwind”), in reference to shepherds' privies or the former use of beakheads on that side of the ship for urination and defecation; or a clipped form of the name of the unpopular 19th-century Countess of Lichfield Lady Harriett Georgiana Louisa Hamilton Anson, who was the subject of an 1867 prank whereby her bedroom's name-card was placed on the door to the lavatory, prompting the other guests to begin speaking of "going to Lady Louisa".

I suppose it is unreal because we have been expecting it [sc. World War II] for so long now, and have known that it must be got over before we can go on with our lives. Like in the night when you want to go to the loo and it is miles away down a freezing cold passage and yet you know you have to go down that passage before you can be happy and sleep again.

1940, Nancy Mitford, chapter II, in Pigeon Pie, page 27:

Ensure that the tents are well-sited and clean, rubbish bins empty, and that the loos have toilet paper.

2006, Garth Thompson et al., The Guide′s Guide to Guiding, 3rd edition, page 160:

(UK, Ireland, Commonwealth) A lavatory: a room used for urination and defecation.

The lack of running water in rural areas often makes Western-style loos hygienic disasters. Suddenly the noncontact squat toilet doesn′t look like such a bad option any more (as long as you roll up your trouser legs).

2009, Katharina Kane, Lonely Planet: The Gambia and Senegal, page 275:

Waterless urinals are a great way of keeping the guys out of the cubicle toilets, keeping the urine separated from the solid waste (when using composting loos) and reducing water consumption if you have flush loos.

2010, Meegan Jones, Sustainable Event Management, page 206:

(UK, Ireland, Commonwealth) A toilet: a fixture used for urination and defecation.


medium

medium (countable and uncountable, plural mediums)

Borrowed from Latin medium, neuter of medius (“middle”), from Proto-Italic *meðjos, from Proto-Indo-European *médʰyos (“between”). Compare middle. Doublet of mid, medio, media, and meson.

(countable, Ireland, dated, informal) A half-pint serving of Guinness (or other stout in some regions).


fish finger

fish fingers (plural)
fishfinger (alternative)

“Birds Eye fish fingers,” he said, “are made from cod, and when, a short while back there was talk of some strange deep sea varieties creeping into fish fingers, we, as a company spent £500 000 reassuring the consumer[…].”

1976, Fishing News International, volume 15, page 41:

Next week will solve your problems / But now, fish fingers all in a line

1977, “Ex-Lion Tamer”, in Pink Flag, performed by Wire:

After green peas, the product that most helped Birds Eye was fish fingers.

2007, Michael Symons, chapter XX, in One Continuous Picnic: A Gastronomic History of Australia, page 242:

2009, Linda Larsen, The $7 Meals Cookbook: 301 Delicious, Nutritious Recipes the Whole Family Will Love, Adams Media, MA, page 148,
Fish fingers are usually sold in very large packages, about 3–5 pounds.

If chip butties are the king of beige, fish finger sarnies are the queen. Home-made fish fingers are super-easy to make and freeze well, so make a large batch and keep them for a rainy day.

2012, Tom Herbert, Henry Herbert, The Fabulous Baker Brothers, unnumbered page:

(chiefly UK, Ireland) A rectangular stick of processed fish coated in breadcrumbs that is cooked by frying or grilling.


pattern

From earlier patten, paterne, from Middle English patron (“patron; example”), from Old French patron, from Medieval Latin patrōnus (“patron”). Doublet of padrone, patron, Patronus, and patroon.

skemo

intelligible arrangement which has a mathematical, geometric, statistical etc. relationship

(Ireland, Roman Catholicism) The devotions that take place within a parish on the feast day of the patron saint of that parish.

pátrún

devotions that take place on the feast day of a patron saint


crust

en-noun

crust (countable and uncountable, plural crusts)

From Middle English cruste, from Anglo-Norman and Old French cruste, from Latin crusta (“hard outer covering”), from Proto-Indo-European *krustós (“hardened”), from *krews- (“to form a crust, begin to freeze”), related to Old Norse hroðr (“scurf”), Old English hruse (“earth”), Old High German hrosa (“crust, ice”), Latvian kruvesis (“frozen mud”), Ancient Greek κρύος (krúos, “frost, icy cold”), κρύσταλλος (krústallos, “crystal, ice”), Avestan 𐬑𐬭𐬎𐬰𐬛𐬭𐬀- (xruzdra-, “hard”), Sanskrit क्रूड् (krūḍ, “thicken, make hard”).

cog

(British, Australia, New Zealand, Ireland, Canada, Northern US) A slice of bread cut from the end of a loaf; the heel.


burgle

en-verb

burgle (third-person singular simple present burgles, present participle burgling, simple past and past participle burgled)

burgles (present singular third-person)
burgling (participle present)
burgled (participle past)
burgled (past)

In St. Louis, burglars burgle by daylight

1867 March 14, “This and That”, in Delaware Tribune, Wilmington, DE, page 1:

The New York World has coined a new verb -- "to burgle."

1867 August 24, Sydney Morning Herald, Sydney, page 8:

The language grows apace. A "cablegram" has been received, and $400 have been "burgled."

1868 February 13, Louisville Daily Courier, Louisvile, KY, page 4:

Burgled his safe and bolted with the tin.

1868, John Brougham, Much Ado About a Merchant of Venice, New York: Samuel French, page 13:

[S]he went and burgled three pears out of the dish ...

1869, Joanna H. Mathews, Bessie at School, London: James Nisbet & Co., page 183:

Conceive the Great Lexicographer admitting to his Dictionary such excrescencies as: "Burgle, verb active, To break into a dwelling-house,"

1870 February 5, “American Slangography”, in Punch, London, page 44:

Burglarize, to, a term creeping into journalism. ... The word has a dangerous rival in the shorter burgle.

1872, M. Schele De Vere, Americanisms: The English of the New World, New York: Charles Scribner, page 587:

When an American says, "I've been burgled" -- where an Englishman would say, "My house has been broken into by thieves" -- he succeeds in shortening the statement by more than half ...

1873 April 21, Albert Julius Mott, “Inaugural Address”, in Proceedings of the Literary and Philosophical Society of Liverpool, volume xxvii, London: Longman, Greens, Reader & Dyer, page 30:

Well, I hope to goodness the house won’t be burgled during the night.

1892, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, “The Beryl Coronet”, in The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes, HTML edition, The Gutenberg Project, published 2011:

(UK, Ireland, Commonwealth) To commit burglary.

And when scrum-half Ben Youngs, who had a poor game, was burgled by opposite number Irakli Abuseridze and the ball shipped down the line to Irakli Machkhaneli, it looked like Georgia had scored a try of their own, but the winger's foot was in touch.

2011 September 18, Ben Dirs, “Rugby World Cup 2011: England 41-10 Georgia”, in BBC Sport:

Foden did his job admirably. The fact that both City goals came from burgling possession in the final third indicated how successfully City managed collectively to disrupt Real’s buildup play.

2020 August 7, Jonathan Liew, “Phil Foden stars to offer Manchester City glimpse of multiple futures”, in The Guardian:

(UK, Ireland, sports) To take the ball legally from an opposing player.


spanner

Japanese: スパナ (supana)

Korean: 스패너 (seupaeneo)

Malay: sepana

مِفْتَاح إِنْجْلِيزِيّ m (miftāḥ ʔinglīziyy, literally “English key”)

га́ечны ключ m (háječny ključ, literally “nut key”)

га́ечен ключ m (gáečen ključ, literally “nut key”)

γερμανικό κλειδί n (germanikó kleidí, literally “German key”)

га́ечный ключ m (gáječnyj ključ, literally “nut key”)

гайкови́й ключ m (hajkovýj ključ, literally “nut key”)

Pass me that spanner, Jake; there's just one more bolt to screw in.

(Commonwealth, UK, Ireland) A hand tool for adjusting nuts and bolts.

The groove in this toolholder is what the spanner grabs onto when you are changing the tool.

(Canada, US) Any of certain types of such a tool that have a pin or hook to engage the driven object.

Halfway through the production of Macbeth, the director found that the stage was smaller than he expected. This really threw a spanner in the works.

(UK, Ireland) A problem, dilemma or obstacle; something unexpected or troublesome (in the phrase spanner in the works)

You spanner, Rodney! I wanted some time, not a bunch of thyme!

(UK, Ireland, mildly derogatory) A stupid or unintelligent person; one prone to making mistakes, especially in language.


semi

LL-Q1860 (eng)-I learned some phrases-semi.wav

The prefix semi- (from Latin) used as a noun.

2008, Elliott Placks, quoted in Helen Isbister, Morris Bryant, Property, Career FAQs, Australia, page 40,
I′m selling two side-by-side semis that are currently under construction, a waterfront apartment and a house in Rose Bay.

The smaller semis of the 1920s and 1930s were closely related to the three bedroom pre-1919 narrow fronted terraces, at least to the larger pre-1919 terraces.

2008, Barry Goodchild, Homes, Cities and Neighbourhoods: Planning and the Residential Landscapes of Modern Britain, page 52:

The roads were lined with cramped little semis and 1960s bungalows: Britain's cheapest houses, in their flimsy, pebble-dashed glory.

2012, Tim Moore, You Are Awful (But I Like You): Travels Around Unloved Britain, Vintage, →ISBN, page 150:

(UK, Ireland, Australia, Canada, informal) A semi-detached house.


bobby

From the given name of Sir Robert Peel, who established London’s police force.

If I am wrong, and if Lessingham’s wrong, how do you explain his extraordinary insistence on taking it inside the cab with him, which the bobby describes?

(British, Ireland, Australia, slang) A police officer.

(British, Ireland, Australia, slang) A railway signaller.


traveller

travellers (plural)
traveler (alternative US)

From Middle English traveler, travelour, travailere, travailour (“worker", also "traveller”), equivalent to travel + -er. Compare Anglo-Norman travailur, travailour, Old French travailleor, travelleeur, travelier.

It provoked criticism for its portrayal of a woman who leaves her marriage for life with a solitary traveler. Irish women did not do those sorts of things, the audiences felt (although the plot came from a story told to Synge on Inis Meain).

2010, R. Todd Felton, A Journey Into Ireland's Literary Revival, →ISBN, page 213:

Kevin chases after him through a forest and finds the horse with Joseph Maguire (Ian Holm), a poetry-reciting traveler (Irish gypsy).

2012, Mark Connelly, The IRA on Film and Television: A History, →ISBN, page 212:

...settled Irish people of Southern Ireland treat the traveler boys with racist hostility (2001 180–81).

2012, Maria Pramaggiore, Irish and African American Cinema, →ISBN, page 152:

(Ireland) Alternative letter-case form of Traveller.


guard

guards (plural)
gard (alternative obsolete)
garde (alternative obsolete)
guarde (alternative obsolete)

From Middle English garde, from early Middle French or late Old French guarde (“a guardian, warden, keeper”) (whence modern French garde), from the verb guarder. Doublet of garda, which is from Irish.

der

The Garda Regulations 1924 required a candidate for appointment as a guard to be able to produce satisfactory references as to his character

2016, Anastasia Dukova, A History of the Dublin Metropolitan Police and its Colonial Legacy, Springer, →ISBN, page 139:


gar

Belone belone
Belone belone#Translingual

(especially UK, Ireland) A garfish, Belone belone.


arch

en-adj

arch (comparative archer, superlative archest)

archer (comparative)
archest (superlative)

From the prefix arch-. "Principal" is the original sense; "mischievous" is via onetime frequent collocation with rogue, knave, etc.


buck

en-verb

buck (third-person singular simple present bucks, present participle bucking, simple past and past participle bucked)

bucks (present singular third-person)
bucking (participle present)
bucked (participle past)
bucked (past)

From dialectal buck ("to give in, yield"; also bug (“to bend”)), from Middle Low German bucken (“to bend”) or Middle Dutch bucken, bocken (“to bend”), intensive forms of Old Saxon būgan and Old Dutch *būgan (“to bend, bow”), both from Proto-West Germanic *beugan, from Proto-Germanic *būganą (“to bend”), from Proto-Indo-European *bʰūgʰ- (“to bend”). Influenced in some senses by buck “male goat” (see above). Sense “to meet, to encounter” is a semantic loan from Jamaican Creole buck.
Compare bow and elbow.

gl

"to give in, yield"; also <i class="Latn mention" lang="en">bug</i> (“to bend”)

Well he yoked the ass up to the cart. And then the holy ructions it did start. Well he bucked it in the air and he bucked it all around. Till he smashed the buckin' cart upon the ground.

1997 February 20, “Mickey's buckin' ass”performed by Richie Kavanagh:

Thatch had come down the stairs and chimed in: "Isn't he an awful buckin' eejit?"

"Was he a buccaneer?" I asked. "No, eejit!" Lionel said. Never one to pass up a play on words, he continued, "He's a buckin' IRA man and he's gathering up an army in the Irish Free State. He says he's going to march up to Ulster and drive all of us Protestants into the Irish Sea!"

"I can see the headlines in the morning, taxi man bucking hangs himself.

2012 January 28, 20:01 from the start, in Mrs Brown's Boys (Mammy's Going) (2), episode 5, spoken by Agnes Brown (Brendan O'Carroll):

I will buck a French lad, Erin. I will buck a French lad, so help me God.

2018 January 11, 13:39 from the start, in Derry Girls (1), episode 2, spoken by Michelle Mallon (Jamie-Lee O'Donnell):

Protestors chanted "You're not wanted here" and held up placards with slogans such as "Buck off" - a pun on Chelsea chairman Bruce Buck's name - and "No to racist Ricketts".

2022 April 2, Emma Smith, “Watch: 'Buck off!' - Chelsea fans stage 'No to racist Ricketts' ownership protest outside Stamford Bridge”, in goal.com:

(chiefly Ireland, humorous or euphemistic) To fuck.


kip

1760–70, probably related to Danish kippe (“dive, hovel, cheap inn”) and Middle Low German kiffe (“hovel”). From the same distant Germanic root as cove.

(informal, chiefly UK, Ireland) A place to sleep; a rooming house; a bed.

I’m just going for my afternoon kip.

(informal, chiefly UK, Ireland, Commonwealth) Sleep, snooze, nap, forty winks, doze.

(informal, chiefly UK, Ireland) A very untidy house or room.

(informal, chiefly UK, Ireland, dated) A brothel.


root

en-verb

root (third-person singular simple present roots, present participle rooting, simple past and past participle rooted)

roots (present singular third-person)
rooting (participle present)
rooted (participle past)
rooted (past)
wrout (alternative dialectal)
rout (alternative dialectal)
wroot (alternative obsolete)

From Middle English wrōten (“to dig with the snout”), from Old English wrōtan, from Proto-West Germanic *wrōtan, from Proto-Germanic *wrōtaną (“to dig out, to root”). Related to Old English wrōt (“snout; trunk”). Loss of initial w- probably due to influence from the related noun (Etymology 1).

inh

(Australia, New Zealand, Ireland, vulgar, slang) To sexually penetrate.

еба

coarse slang: to have sexual intercourse


snog

en-verb

snog (third-person singular simple present snogs, present participle snogging, simple past and past participle snogged)

snogs (present singular third-person)
snogging (participle present)
snogged (participle past)
snogged (past)

2016 Alya, "Gamer", Miraculous
This is about stepping up and representing, not snuggling up and snogging. This is serious business.

(UK, Ireland, Commonwealth, colloquial) To kiss passionately.


crack

en-noun

crack (countable and uncountable, plural cracks)

→ Finnish: crack

→ Swedish: crack

From Middle English crakken, craken, from Old English cracian (“to resound, crack”), from Proto-West Germanic *krakōn, from Proto-Germanic *krakōną (“to crack, crackle, shriek”), ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *gerh₂- (“to resound, cry hoarsely”).
Cognate with Scots crak (“to crack”), West Frisian kreakje (“to crack”), Dutch kraken (“to crunch, creak, squeak”), Low German kraken (“to crack”), German krachen (“to crash, crack, creak”), Lithuanian gi̇̀rgžděti (“to creak, squeak”), Old Armenian կարկաչ (karkačʻ), Sanskrit गर्जति (gárjati, “to roar, hum”).
Compare typologically English crevice derived from Latin crepō, Bulgarian пукнатина (puknatina) akin to пу́кам (púkam), Russian тре́щина (tréščina) akin to треск (tresk), щель (ščelʹ) akin to щёлкать (ščólkatʹ).

cog

The party was great crack.

He's good crack. [It's nice having him around]

But first I maun hae a crack wi' an auld acquaintance here.—Mr. Owen, Mr. Owen, how's a' wi' ye, man?

1817, Walter Scott, chapter 5, in Rob Roy, volume 2, Edinburgh: James Ballantyne and Company, published 1818, page 193:

He seed 'em bawth as he coom'd frae t' Nab, / Nobbut aaf an hooer agone: / An' he stopp'd, did Jan, for a bit of a crack, / For t' gells was lahk aloan.

1865, Arthur Munby, “T' Moossel Getherers”, in Verses New and Old, London: Bell and Daldy, page 54:

Being a native of Northumberland, she was enjoying their banter and Geordie good humour. This was what she needed — good company and good crack.

2001, William F. Gray, The Villain, iUniverse, page 214:

"his a bit o' good crack — interesting to talk to"

2004, Bill Griffiths, Dictionary of North East Dialect, Northumbria University Press (quoting Dunn, 1950)

By the time we've got a good drunk on us there'll be more crack in this valley than the night I pissed on the electric fence!

2006, Patrick McCabe, Winterwood, Bloomsbury, published 2007, page 10:

(Northern England, Scotland, Ireland) Conviviality; fun; good conversation, chat, gossip, or humorous storytelling; good company.

What's the crack?

What's this crack about a possible merger?

But, aw see yo known him weel enough; an' so aw'll tell yo a bit of a crack abeawt him an' Owd Neddy.

1869, Edwin Waugh, “Ramble from Bury to Rochdale”, in Lancashire Sketches, 3rd edition, London: Simpkin, Marshall, & Co.:

(Northern England, Scotland, Ireland) Business; events; news.


joey

Unknown. Older and more general sources state that joey comes from an Australian aboriginal language (cited as joè), but newer sources that focus on Australian English and aboriginal languages say the origin is unknown. The Australian National Dictionary includes a sense of “young possum” with citations predating the earliest “young kangaroo” citations.

"Visit in two days though," said Tommo. "Hang in there mate, got a joey coming, we'll be sweet then."

2012, John Hoskison, Inside: One Man's Experience of Prison:

(UK, Ireland, prison slang) A parcel smuggled in to an inmate.


pee

Spelling of the abbreviation p of pence.

I bought these carrots for fifty pee.

I can't afford that — I'm one pee short.

(British, Ireland, colloquial) Pence; penny (a quantity of money)


dandy

→ Dutch: dandy

→ Esperanto: dando

→ Finnish: dandy

→ French: dandy, → French: dundee

→ German: Dandy

desc

→ Japanese: ダンディ, ダンディー

→ Japanese: ダンディ, ダンディー

→ Limburgish: dèndie

→ Polish: dandy

→ Spanish: dandy

Borrowed from Scots dandy (“a fop; one who is well-dressed”). Of uncertain origin.
Possibly from Dandy, a diminutive of Andrew, yet the Scots word is used also in reference to women. Alternatively, possibly a back-formation of Scots dandilly, dandillie (“one who is spoiled or pampered; a "pet"”). Compare English dandle and dander.

bor

Somebody quite as notorious as Brummell, but whose follies have been far more mischievous; whose eloquence is great, but certainly not always refined; and to whose health many a dandy of whisky has been tossed off.

1844, William Jesse, The life of George Brummell, page 57:

(UK, Ireland, slang, archaic) A small glass of whisky.


jam sandwich

(UK, Ireland, slang) (from the common UK colour scheme of white with a red reflective horizontal band) A police car.


whenever

From Middle English whan evere, whanne ever, whanne evere, whener, when ever; equivalent to when + ever.

Whenever I was a child, I lived in Arkansas.

(Ireland, regional US, nonstandard) When.


candy floss

en-noun

candy floss (usually uncountable, plural candy flosses)

(UK, Ireland) Heated sugar spun into thin threads and collected into a mass, usually on a stick.


acushla

From Irish a chuisle (“O pulse (of my heart)”).

bor

Parker, acushla, you’re an honour to Scotland Yard.

1928, Dorothy L. Sayers, chapter 2, in Whose Body?:

To her surprise, the grass was slick with dew, its texture unusually luxuriant beneath her hands as she spread her skirts to cover her ankles. It was springy and supple, the rich deep green of springtime. “Why do you frown, acushla?”

2012, Laura Parker, A Rose in Splendor, →ISBN:


pepper

en-noun

pepper (countable and uncountable, plural peppers)

peppers (plural)
piper (alternative archaic)

Tok Pisin: pepa

→ Hawaiian: pepa

→ Marshallese: pepa

From Middle English peper, piper, from Old English piper, from Proto-West Germanic *pipar, from Latin piper, from an Indo-Aryan source; compare Sanskrit पिप्पलि (pippali, “long pepper”). The name was given to the capsicum fruit because of its unusual spicy taste, not unlike the Old World spice. Cognate with Scots pepar, Saterland Frisian Pieper, West Frisian piper, Dutch peper, German Low German Peper, German Pfeffer, Danish peber, Swedish peppar, Icelandic pipar. Doublet of falafel and peepul.

cog

en:any of various Capsicum varieties; their fruit

(UK, US, Ireland and Canada) A fruit of the capsicum plant: red, green, yellow or white, hollow and containing seeds, and in a wide range of mild (sweet, nonspicy) to hot (spicy) varieties.

болга́рский пе́рец m (bolgárskij pérec, literally “Bulgarian pepper”)


agree

en-verb

agree (third-person singular simple present agrees, present participle agreeing, simple past and past participle agreed)

agrees (present singular third-person)
agreeing (participle present)
agreed (participle past)
agreed (past)

From Middle English agreen, from Old French agreer (“to accept or receive kindly”), from a gré (“favorably”), from Latin ad (“to”) + gratum (“pleasing”), ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *gʷerH- (“to welcome, greet, praise”).

der

... and there, after a good while in discourse, we did agree a bargain of £5,000 with Sir Roger Cuttance for my Lord Sandwich for silk, cinnamon, ...

1666, Samuel Pepys, The Diary of Samuel Pepys, page 88:

The essential idea is that parties should enter the market, choose their contractors, set their own terms and agree a bargain.

2005, Paddy McNutt, Law, economics and antitrust: towards a new perspective, page 59:

Bishops agree sex abuse rules

2011 April 3, John Burke, The Sunday Business Post:

(transitive, UK, Ireland) To yield assent to; to approve.


chip

→ Basque: txip

→ Bulgarian: чипс (čips)

→ Catalan: xip

→ Czech: čip

→ Danish: chip, chips

→ Dutch: chip, chips

→ Ewe: tšipsid

→ Finnish: sipsi, chipsi, chips

→ French: chips

→ Galician: chip

→ Georgian: ჩიპსი (čiṗsi)

→ German: Chip

→ Greek: τσιπ (tsip), τσιπάκι (tsipáki)

desc

→ Hebrew: צִ׳יפְּס, צִ׳יפּ

→ Hebrew: צִ׳יפְּס, צִ׳יפּ (chips, chip)

→ Hijazi Arabic: تشبس (tšips, tšibs), شبس (šips, šibs)

→ Hungarian: csip, csipsz, chip, chips

→ Indonesian: cip

→ Italian: chip

→ Japanese: チップ (chippu), チップス (chippusu)

→ Khmer: ឈីប (chiip)

→ Korean: 칩 (chip), 칩스 (chipseu)

→ Latvian: čipsis

→ Macedonian: чипс (čips), чип (čip)

→ Norwegian: chips

→ Persian: چیپس (čips)

→ Polish: czip, czips, chip, chips

→ Portuguese: chipe, chip, chips

→ Romanian: chips, cip

→ Russian: чипс (čips), чип (čip)

^ → Armenian: չիպ (čʻip)

→ Serbo-Croatian:

Cyrillic script: чипс, чип

Latin script: čips, čip

→ Slovene: čips

→ Spanish: chip, chips

→ Swahili: chipsi, chips

→ Swedish: chips, chipp

→ Turkish: cips, çip

→ Ukrainian: чипс (čyps), чип (čyp)

→ Welsh: tsip

→ Yiddish: טשיפּל (tshipl)

Noun from Middle English chip, chippe, from Old English ċipp (“chip; small piece of wood, shaving”), from Old English *ċippian (“to cut; hew”) – attested in Old English forċippian (“to cut off”) –, from Proto-West Germanic *kippōn (“to cut; carve; hack; chop”), from Proto-Germanic *kippōną (“to chip, chop”), from Proto-Indo-European *ǵeyb- (“to split; divide; germinate; sprout”). Related to Dutch kip, keep (“notch; nick; score”), Dutch kippen (“to hatch”), German Low German kippen (“to cut; clip; trim; shorten”), German kipfen (“to chop off the tip; snip”), Old Swedish kippa (“to chop”). Compare also chop.
The formally similar Old English ċipp, ċypp, ċyp (“a beam; log; stock; post”), from Proto-Germanic *kippaz (“log; beam”) (whence Old Saxon kip (“post”), Old High German kipfa, chipfa (“axle, stave”), Old Norse keppr (“cudgel, club”)) is a different, unrelated word either borrowed from Latin cippus (“stake; pale; post”) or borrowed from the same source language as the Latin.
Verb from Middle English chippen, from Old English *ċippian (“to cut; hew”) – attested in Old English forċippian (“to cut off”) – see above.

cog

I always say the best way to judge an establishment is by its chips because if you can’t master that, what can you do?

2023 July 21, Billie Schwab Dunn, “I Tried Wetherspoons Food for the First Time-I Feared I'd Get Scurvy...”, in Daily Star:

Do you want ketchup, mustard, or mayonnaise on your chips?

Fish and chips is a traditional British dish.

(UK, Ireland, Australia, New Zealand, archaic in Canada, usually in the plural) A deep-fried strip of potato; see also usage note at french fries.


ditch

From Middle English dich, from Old English dīċ (“trench, moat”) from Proto-Germanic *dīkaz (compare Swedish dike, Icelandic díki, West Frisian dyk (“dam”), Dutch dijk (“dam”), German Teich (“pond”)), from Proto-Indo-European *dʰeygʷ- (“to stick, set up”) (compare Latin fīgō (“to affix, fasten”), Lithuanian diegti (“to prick; plant”), dýgsti (“to geminate, grow”)). Doublet of dike.

inh

snitches get stitches and wind up in ditches

You flung a ditch on my vision
Of beauty, love and truth.
O stony grey soil of Monaghan
You burgled my bank of youth!

c. 1947, Patrick Kavanagh, “Stony Grey Soil”, Poetry Selections, in Ireland Study Abroad, University Park, Pennsylvania: Pennsylvania State University, archived from the original on 2021-03-14, page 1:

The original ditches were created by digging trenches, as boundaries and/or irrigation. But to the English, the ditch is the trench. Whereas in Ireland, the ditch is the raised bank of earth and the hedgerow on top. (As for the trench, where I come from that’s a sheugh).

2013 October 31, Frank McNally, “When Anglophone lines get crossed”, in The Irish Times, Dublin: Irish Times Trust, archived from the original on 2021-03-14:

(Ireland) A raised bank of earth and the hedgerow on top.


sketch

→ German: Sketch

→ Italian: sketch

desc

→ Portuguese: esquete (Brasilian), sketch (European)

→ Turkish: skeç

From Dutch schets or German Skizze, from Italian schizzo, from Latin schedium, from Ancient Greek σχέδιος (skhédios, “made suddenly, off-hand”), from σχεδόν (skhedón, “near, nearby”), from ἔχω (ékhō, “I hold”). Compare scheme.

скеч

brief musical, dramatic or literary work etc.

to keep sketch

(slang, Ireland) A lookout; vigilant watch for something.


perambulator

The reapers were slowly trooping back to their work. The nurse-girl slapped one of her charges and then began to push the perambulator up the hill.

1913, Arthur Conan Doyle, “(please specify the page)”, in The Poison Belt […], London; New York, N.Y.: Hodder and Stoughton, →OCLC:

"That will be all this afternoon," he said to the nurse, who got up with the baby and decanted it into a perambulator which was standing in the fairway.

On Queen Victoria buying numerous perambulators in 1846, their popularity soared, especially among the affluent in society. Faced with carrying growing numbers of them, railways began charging separately for their carriage from the late 1850s. […] Perambulator tickets remained until the late 20th century, although they came to be seen as a restriction on family travel.

2023 October 18, Dr David Turner, “Family values...”, in RAIL, number 994, page 46:


numpty

Borrowed from Scots numpty (“fool, idiot”).

Trust me, he's Pakistani, because that's the average numpty's shorthand for Muslim.

2010, Mick Herron, Slow Horses, page 119:

(UK, Ireland, Commonwealth, derogatory) An idiot, dolt or fool.


craic

A variant of crack (“conviviality, fun; good company; good conversation, chat, gossip, or humorous storytelling; mischief”) (Ireland, Northern Ireland (Ulster)), from Scots crack (“free and easy conversation; gossip, talk”), possibly from Middle English crak (“bursting or splitting sound, crash”), from craken (“to make a bursting or splitting sound, crack”), from Old English cracian (“to make a bursting or splitting sound, crack; to resound”), from Proto-West Germanic *krakōn, from Proto-Germanic *krakōną (“to crack or crackle; to shriek”), ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *gerh₂- (“to cry hoarsely”). Doublet of crack (“thin and usually jagged space opened in a previously solid material”). The spelling craic is partly borrowed:
* from Irish craic, probably from English crack (“conviviality, fun; etc.”) (Ireland, Northern Ireland (Ulster)) (see above); and
* (especially in Scotland) from Scottish Gaelic craic, crac, either from Irish craic or Scots crack (see above).

der

‘It is a great atmosphere, isn’t it?’ Leon was enthusiastic, not at all cryptic or withdrawn, wholeheartedly enjoying the ‘craic’, as he called it, slapping his hand on the table in time to the bodhrán rhythm from the group singing itself hoarse and unharmonious on the stage.

1991, Mary Leland, chapter 10, in Approaching Priests, London: Sinclair-Stevenson, →ISBN, page 172:

"The craic" is how the Irish celebrate life – with music, with laughter, with joy, with old friends (and new friends just waiting to be made). […] Be careful. "The craic" is mighty!

1995 September 9, “Dara: Ireland’s Most Successful Record Label [advertisement]”, in Timothy White, editor, Billboard: The International Newsweekly of Music, Video and Home Entertainment, volume 107, number 36, New York, N.Y.: BPI Communications, →ISSN, →OCLC, page 84:

Most Irish people, you see, when asked to name their preferred aspect of living in Ireland, will instance "the crack". "The crack", which is sometimes annoyingly conveyed in the Irish-language spelling "craic", is a quintessentially Irish indicator of what in other cultures translates roughly as "fun" – except that the crack is much more than fun.

[2004 November 18, John Waters, “What's the crack?”, in Alan Rusbridger, editor, The Guardian, London: Guardian News & Media, →ISSN, →OCLC, archived from the original on 2022-01-29:

[Brendan] Kennelly has been sober for 21 years, but couldn't resist popping into some of the city's myriad Irish pubs. He nursed bottled water and listened to the accents, the stories, the craic.

2007 November 19, Kevin Cullen, “His peace in poetry”, in The Boston Globe, Boston, Mass.: The Globe Newspaper Co., →ISSN, →OCLC, archived from the original on 2025-03-12:

"Sure, it will be a bit of craic," said Beth, "when's the last time a fortune teller came anywhere near here?"

2015, Ben Ritchie, “A Bit of Craic”, in Phil Murphy, editor, Original Writing from Ireland’s Own: An Anthology of the Best Stories from the Annual Writing Competitions Run by Ireland’s Premier Family Magazine, 2015 edition, Dublin: Original Writing, →ISBN, “Highly Commended” section, page 161:

(Ireland) Often preceded by the: amusement, fun, especially through enjoyable company; also, pleasant conversation.

craic

amusement, fun, especially through enjoyable company (cognates) — see also amusement, fun


Happy Christmas

en-noun

Happy Christmas (plural Happy Christmases)

desc

→ Japanese: ハッピークリスマス (happī kurisumasu)

(Ireland, UK) Alternative form of Merry Christmas.


bastard

en-adj

bastard (comparative more bastard, superlative most bastard)

more bastard (comparative)
most bastard (superlative)
bastid (alternative)

From Middle English bastard, bastarde, from Old English bastard (used as an epithet), from Anglo-Norman bastard, Old French bastart (“illegitimate child”), perhaps via Medieval Latin bastardus, of obscure origin.
Possibly from Frankish *bāst (“marriage, relationship”) + Old French -ard, -art (pejorative suffix denoting a specific quality or condition). Frankish *bāst derives from a North Sea Germanic variety of Proto-Germanic *banstuz (“bond, connection, relationship, marriage with a second woman of lower status”), from Proto-Indo-European *bʰendʰ- (“to tie, bind”) and is related to West Frisian boaste (“marriage, matrimony”), Middle Dutch bast (“lust, heat”), and more distantly to English boose (“cow-stall”). The term probably originally referred to a child from a polygynous marriage of heathen Germanic custom — a practice not sanctioned by the Christian churches.
Alternatively, Old French bastart may have originated from the Old French term fils de bast (“packsaddle son”), meaning a child conceived on an improvised bed (medieval saddles often doubled as beds while travelling). However chronology makes this difficult, as bastard is attested in Old French from 1089 (Middle Latin bastardus as early as 1010), yet Old French bast (modern French bât), though attested since 1130 with the meaning of "beast of burden", doesn't acquire the specific meaning of "packsaddle" until the 13c., making it too late to have given rise to the terms bastard and bastardus with this sense. The French Centre National de Ressources Textuelles et Lexicales supports the Germanic theory further above as being most likely.

unk

obscure

ondermaats

of abnormal, irregular or otherwise inferior qualities (size, shape etc.)

I’ve got a bastard headache.


drop

From Late Middle English droppe, Middle English drope (“small quantity of liquid; small or least amount of something; pendant jewel; dripping of a liquid; a shower; nasal flow, catarrh; speck, spot; blemish; disease causing spots on the skin”) [and other forms], from Old English dropa (“a drop”), from Proto-West Germanic *dropō (“drop (of liquid)”), from Proto-Germanic *drupô (“drop (of liquid)”), from Proto-Indo-European *dʰrewb- (“to crumble, grind”).

nb...

dropan, droupe, (Northern England) droipe

afval

small quantity of liquid, just large enough to hold its own round shape through surface tension

piisk

very small quantity of liquid, or of anything

piisk

that which hangs or resembles a liquid globule

langemine

decline in degree, quality, quantity, or rate

afgrond

distance through which something drops, or falls below a certain level

(figuratively) A very small quantity of liquid, or (by extension) of anything.

(Ireland, informal) A single measure of whisky.


WC

→ Czech: WC

→ Dutch: wc

→ Estonian: veetsee, vets

→ Finnish: WC, vessa

→ French: WC

→ Greek: βεσέ (vesé)

→ German: WC

→ Hungarian: WC

→ Polish: WC, wuce

→ Portuguese: WC

→ Romanian: WC, veceu

→ Serbo-Croatian: WC, vece

In the summer of 1877, a gentleman with whom I was well acquainted, took lodgings in Preston-street, Brighton. The morning after his arrival, he found in the W.C. some leaves of an old black-letter book.

1880, William Blades, The Enemies of Books, page 54:

(UK, Ireland, Commonwealth) Initialism of water closet: a lavatory; a toilet.


rounders

From round + -er + -s, presumably for the circuit that batters make around the field.

(UK, Ireland) A team sport played with bat and ball with one fielding side and one batting side. It is similar to softball and baseball.


pong

1992, Bryce Courtenay, Tandia, Volume 1, 2011, Read How You Want, page 109,
She sniffed, squiffing up her nose. ‘What a pong! Do they all smell like this?’

I can remember calling round once and when she answered the door I was greeted by an unmistakable, noxious pong. “I can smell gas!”
I said. “Oh, have I left the ring on?” she asked vaguely.

1998, Catherine Fox, Heaven′s Scent: Third Way, page 13:

2000, Susan Sallis, 2011, unnumbered page,
‘I see what you mean about the pong. I couldn′t smell it on myself but I can smell it on you!’

If you want to empty a crowded room strong body pong will usually do the trick.

2009, Martin Fine, The Devil′s Fragrance, page 109:

(UK, Ireland, Commonwealth, slang) A stench, a bad smell.


pong

en-verb

pong (third-person singular simple present pongs, present participle ponging, simple past and past participle ponged)

pongs (present singular third-person)
ponging (participle present)
ponged (participle past)
ponged (past)

1997, Taufiq Ismail, David M. E. Roskies (translator and editor), Stop Thief!, Black Clouds Over the Isle of Gods and Other Modern Indonesian Short Stories, page 97,
On she walked at a crawling pace, ponging of sweat, drops of mucus and blood falling between her feet.

2009, Susan Brocker, Saving Sam, HarperCollins, New Zealand, unnumbered page,
The place ponged, like the smell of stale cat pee.

“[…]That toothless bloke ponged. Couldn′t you smell him? He smelled like a bloody pub floor at closing time.”

2010, Robin Easton, Naked in Eden: My Adventure and Awakening in the Australian Rainforest, page 63:

2011, Victor Pemberton, We′ll Sing at Dawn, 2012, eBook, Headline Publishing, unnumbered page,
[…] and this evening, Eileen Perkins′s daughter Rita ponged with the smell of cheap carbolic soap, after a late-afternoon visit to the public baths down Hornsey Road.

(UK, Ireland, Commonwealth, slang) To stink, to smell bad.


old money

(British, Ireland) The monetary system used in the United Kingdom and Ireland before decimalisation in 1971 and consisting of pounds, shillings, pence and farthings.


new penny

en-noun

new penny (plural new pence or new pennies)

(British, Ireland, dated) Following decimalisation, the name given to the coin worth one hundredth of a pound; now known simply as the penny. Symbol: p


bloody

en-adj

bloody (comparative bloodier, superlative bloodiest)

bloodier (comparative)
bloodiest (superlative)
bloudy (alternative obsolete)
bl**dy (alternative)

From Middle English blody, blodi, from Old English blōdiġ, blōdeġ (“bloody”), from Proto-West Germanic *blōdag, from Proto-Germanic *blōþagaz (“bloody”), equivalent to blood + -y. Cognate with Dutch bloedig (“bloody”), German blutig (“bloody”), Danish blodig (“bloody”), Swedish blodig (“bloody”), Icelandic blóðugur (“bloody”). See Wikipedia for thoughts on sense evolution.

Traffic in central London was a bloody mess this morning.

There seems to be something wrong with our bloody ships today.

1916 May 31, David Beatty during the Battle of Jutland

Try to keep those bloody women's bloody heads on their bloody shoulders by somehow helping them make this whole mad impossible scheme actually work.

1994, Robert Jordan, Lord of Chaos, page 519:

You are not to go asking anyone about who killed that bloody dog.

2003, Mark Haddon, The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time, page 64:

“You bloody fool, I could′ve stabbed you in the heart,” David said in mock anger, and then smiled widely.

2007, James MacFarlane, Avenge My Kin, Book 2: A Time of Testing, page 498

With 109km of fixed infrastructure, of which only 50% is utilised, Perry's message is simple: "put more bloody trains on it!"

2024 January 24, Dyan Perry talks to Nick Brodrick, “The industry has given me so much”, in RAIL, number 1001, page 45:

(informal, British, Ireland, Commonwealth, Hawaii, mildly vulgar) Used as an intensifier.


bloody

en-adv

bloody (comparative more bloody, superlative most bloody)

more bloody (comparative)
most bloody (superlative)
bloudy (alternative obsolete)
bl**dy (alternative)

Walk! Not bloody likely. [Sensation]. I am going in a taxi. [She goes out].

1912 (date written), [George] Bernard Shaw, “Pygmalion”, in Androcles and the Lion, Overruled, Pygmalion, London: Constable and Company, published 1916, →OCLC, Act III, page 153:

"Dice are no bloody good," David said.

1994, Robert Jordan, Lord of Chaos, page 109:

(informal, Australia, British, India, Ireland, Newfoundland, New Zealand, South Africa, mildly vulgar) Used to express anger, annoyance, or shock, or for emphasis.


bank holiday

bank holidays (plural)
Bank Holiday (alternative)
bank-holiday (alternative)

Historically, a holiday, other than a public holiday, observed by the Bank of England.

On a bank holiday weekend.

(UK, Ireland) A weekday, often a Monday, on which most businesses are closed, and granted to workers as a national holiday.

wettelijke feestdag

a weekday granted to workers as a national holiday

საბანკო არდადეგები (sabanḳo ardadegebi) (very rare, usually as translation)


uni

I'm going to uni after I leave school.

Turn left when you reach the uni.

(colloquial, chiefly UK, Ireland, Commonwealth) University.


arse bandit

And all the sodomites and catamites, poncey sausage jockeys, arse bandits, turd burglars and fudge packers, fur burger-licking carpet munchers, gormless imbeciles, morons, geeks, cretins and retards […]

2011, Bruce Mason, The Telomere Conspiracy, page 96:

(UK, Ireland, Commonwealth, slang, derogatory) A gay man.


buggery

en-noun

buggery (countable and uncountable, plural buggeries)

Whosoever shall be convicted of the abominable crime of buggery […] shall be liable at the discretion of the court to be kept in penal servitude for life or for any term not less than ten years.

1861, United Kingdom, Offences Against the Person Act 1861:

Whosoever shall be convicted of the abominable Crime of Buggery, committed either with Mankind or with any Animal, shall be liable, at the Discretion of the Court, to be kept in Penal Servitude for Life or for any Term not less than Ten Years.

1861, Parliament of the United Kingdom, “Section 61”, in Offences against the Person Act 1861^(Offences against the Person Act 1861), page 833:

(Commonwealth, UK, Ireland) Any sexual act deemed against nature, such as homosexuality, bestiality or necrophilia.

It's gone to buggery.

(Commonwealth, UK, Ireland, slang) A broken or damaged condition.


buggery

Did he help? Did he buggery!

(Commonwealth, UK, Ireland, vulgar, colloquial) Used after an inverted subject pronoun and auxiliary verb or copula to emphatically negate the verb.


LSD

(British, Ireland, dated) Initialism of £sd (pounds, shillings, pence).


semibreve

From Italian semibreve, ultimately from Latin semi- (“half”) and Latin brevis (“short”).

(music, UK, Ireland, Commonwealth) A musical note four beats long in 4/4 time; a whole note (US)

โน้ตตัวกลม (not-tua-klom, literally “round body note”)


rime

en-verb

rime (third-person singular simple present rimes, present participle riming, simple past and past participle rimed)

rimes (present singular third-person)
riming (participle present)
rimed (participle past)
rimed (past)

From Irish ruaim, from Old Irish rúam (“alder tree; alder bark; dye for wool made from alder bark; dun or red colour”) (probably whence Irish ruaimnigh, Old Irish rúamnaigid (“to dye red”)); further etymology unknown.

der

(transitive, Ireland, rare) To dye (wool or yarn) reddish-brown by boiling or soaking in water with alder twigs.

värjätä leppärisuilla

to dye (wool or yarn) reddish-brown by boiling or soaking in water with alder twigs


queue

From Middle English queue, quew, qwew, couwe, from Anglo-Norman queue, keu and Old French cöe, cue, coe (“tail”), from Vulgar Latin cōda, from Latin cauda. See also Middle French queu, cueue. Doublet of coda and cola.

I was absent-minded at the moment and was last in the queue.

1916, John Buchan, “Chapter 5”, in Greenmantle:

In a report published on October 31, Transport Focus said that a number of train companies were unable to convince it about their ability to sell a full range of tickets, handle cash payments, and avoid excessive queues at ticket machines.

2023 November 15, 'Industry Insider', “Outbreak of common sense”, in RAIL, number 996, page 68:

(UK, Ireland, Commonwealth, less common in North America) A line of people, vehicles or other objects, usually one to be dealt with in sequence (i.e., the one at the front end is dealt with first, the one behind is dealt with next, and so on), and which newcomers join at the opposite end (the back).


sleet

en-noun

sleet (countable and uncountable, plural sleets)

From Middle English slete, probably from Old English *slēte, *slȳte, *slīete, from Proto-West Germanic *slautijā, from Proto-Germanic *slautijǭ (“sleet”). Walter W. Skeat, the author of Etymological Dictionary of the English Language, suggests Old Norse slydda (whence Danish slud (“mixture of rain and snow”)). The word appears to be akin to Low German Sloot (“hail”), dialectal German Schloße (“large hailstone”), Old Gutnish sloyta (“slush, sleet”). Doublet of slut.

cog

(chiefly UK, Ireland, Northeastern US) Precipitation in the form of a mixture of rain and snow.


bum

en-verb

bum (third-person singular simple present bums, present participle bumming, simple past and past participle bummed)

bums (present singular third-person)
bumming (participle present)
bummed (participle past)
bummed (past)

Attested since the 1300s, as Middle English bom (found in John Trevisa's 1387 Translation of the 'Polychronicon' of Ranulph Higden, "his bom is oute"), of uncertain origin. Sometimes suggested to be a shortening of botme, botom, bottum (“bottom”), but this is contradicted by the fact that bottom is not attested in reference to the buttocks until the late 1700s. Suggested by some old and modern references to be onomatopoeic.
Compare also Old Irish, Scottish Gaelic bun (“base, bottom”).

Your bars are fake and my bars are real; / Is it true you got bummed on a field?

2016 December 3, “Soph Aspin Send”, performed by Millie B:

(UK, Ireland, transitive, colloquial) To sodomize; to engage in anal sex.


bum

(more vulgar)

Maxine tried hers. ‘Oh bum,’ she said crossly. ‘The sugar isn’t sugar. It’s salt.’

(UK, Ireland, childish, euphemistic) An expression of annoyance.


shithouse

From shit + house. Compare Middle Low German schîthûs, German Scheißhaus, Swedish skithus, Icelandic skíthús.

(UK, Ireland, Commonwealth, vulgar, derogatory, slang) A coward; one who is overly fearful or timid.


shithouse

The stupefied bus driver kept ranting and raving at him. “You could have been stuffed, mate! Once the water splits it would have been the most shithouse moment in your life, and the last one! This beach is for crocs only![…]”

2005, Eckhard Otto Hardy Marthen, Otto, page 334:

The story goes that when she applied for the job, they were fearful of hiring her because she was ‘much more shithouse than them’. I cannot imagine anyone being worse than those two but she did give it a good go.

2010, Brian Cadd, From This Side of Things, page 255:

(UK, Ireland, Commonwealth, vulgar, slang) Of poor quality.


shithouse

shithouse (third-person singular simple present shithouses, present participle shithousing, simple past and past participle shithoused)

shithouses (present singular third-person)
shithousing (participle present)
shithoused (participle past)
shithoused (past)

2021, Harry Diamond, “Five times El Cholo’s Atleti sh*thoused their way to famous Champions League wins”, in The Football Faithful:

(UK, Ireland, sports, slang) To engage in persistent unsporting behaviour or gamesmanship; to play in a cynical, ugly manner; to cheat without being punished.


crepe

en-noun

crepe (countable and uncountable, plural crepes)

Borrowed from French crêpe, from Latin crispus. Doublet of crisp and crape.

(Ireland) A death notice printed on white card with a background of black crepe paper or cloth, placed on the door of a residence or business.


pain in the arse

pain in the arse (plural pains in the arse)

pains in the arse (plural)
pain in the ass (alternative)

LL-Q1860 (eng)-Vealhurl-pain in the arse.wav

You really are a pain in the arse, aren't you (laugh track)? The PM is going up the wall! Hitting the roof! You can't go around making speeches like that.

1980 February 25, Antony Jay, Jonathan Lynn, “Open Government”, in Yes Minister, season 1, episode 1, spoken by Vic Gould (Edward Jewesbury):

(UK, Ireland, Commonwealth, sometimes considered, vulgar) Someone or something that is annoying or frustrating.


piss

en-verb

piss (third-person singular simple present pisses, present participle pissing, simple past and past participle pissed)

pisses (present singular third-person)
pissing (participle present)
pissed (participle past)
pissed (past)

From Middle English pisse (noun) and pissen (verb), from Old French pissier, possibly from Vulgar Latin *pīssiāre, probably of imitative origin. Compare Old Norse pissa (“to urinate, piss”). Displaced Old English micge.

onom

imitative

"I'll piss this," I thought. "There's only Gary to beat and I beat him easily in both heats."

2018, Carl Fogarty, The World According to Foggy, Hachette UK, →ISBN:

(chiefly UK, Ireland, Commonwealth, transitive) To achieve easily.


trainer

→ Cebuano: trainor
→ English: trainor

(UK, Ireland) A running shoe or sneaker.


runner

From Middle English rennere, rynner, urnare, equivalent to run + -er. Cognate with Old Norse rennari (“runner; messenger”). Displaced earlier Middle English runel (“runner”), from Old English rynel (“runner”; also “messenger, courier”).

vrapues

somebody who runs, who moves at a fast pace

махови́к

mechanical part intended to guide or aid something else to move

(Australia, Canada, Ireland, Scotland) A type of soft-soled shoe originally intended for runners.


middleman

middlemen (plural)
middle man (alternative)
middle-man (alternative)

[ˈmɪdɫ̩ˌmæn]

From Middle English myddil man, equivalent to middle + man.

(Ireland, historical) One who rents land in large tracts, and lets it in small portions to the peasantry.


centre

centres (plural)
center (alternative US)

From Middle English center, centre, from Middle French centre, from Latin centrum, from Ancient Greek κέντρον (kéntron), from κεντεῖν (kenteîn, “to prick, goad”). Doublet of centrum.

So after a short spell in the brass foundry the wisest course was to follow with a similar period in the steel foundry, where much important work was done, including the manufacture of centres for wheels.

1944 November and December, A Former Pupil, “Some Memories of Crewe Works—II”, in Railway Magazine, page 343:

The phrase 'Imperial Manila' is used throughout the archipelago to denote the capital-heavy decision-making and the imposition of the will and culture of the political and economic centre on the peripheries.

2018, Balázs Áron Kovács, Peace Infrastructures and State-Building at the Margins, Springer, →ISBN, page 280:

(British spelling, Canadian spelling, Ireland, South Africa, Australia, New Zealand) Alternative spelling of center.

topapū

A position in Rugby football in the back line


whiskey

en-noun

whiskey (countable and uncountable, plural whiskeys or whiskies)

whiskeys (plural)
whiskies (plural)
whisky (alternative Australia Canada Scotland)

→ Jersey Dutch: wäski

→ Punjabi: ਵਿਸਕੀ (viskī)

→ Welsh: chwisgi

Etymology tree
Proto-Indo-European *wed-
Proto-Indo-European *-r̥
Proto-Indo-European *wódr̥der.
Proto-Celtic *udenskyos
Old Irish uisce
Irish uisce
Proto-Indo-European *gʷeyh₃-
Proto-Indo-European *-wós
Proto-Indo-European *gʷih₃wós
Proto-Celtic *biwos
Proto-Celtic *-tūts
Proto-Celtic *biwotūts
Old Irish bethu
Irish beatha
Medieval Latin aqua vītaecalq.
Irish uisce beathabor.
Old Irish uisce
Scottish Gaelic uisge
Old Irish bethu
Scottish Gaelic beatha
Medieval Latin aqua vītaecalq.
Scottish Gaelic uisge-beathabor.
English usquebaugh
English usque
English whiskey
Variant of usque, abbreviation of usquebaugh, from Irish uisce beatha, calque of Medieval Latin aqua vītae (“water of life”). Compare akvavit, aquavit, aqua vitae, eau de vie, and water of life from the same source and vodka from a Russian diminutive for water in reference to the dilution of pure grain spirits.

der

LL-Q1860 (eng)-عُثمان (Middle river exports)-whiskey.wav

The exceſſive drinking of ſpirituous liquours, eſpecially whiſkey, is now become ſo common, that more people are killed by them, than by ſmall-pox, fevers, broken limbs, accidents, and all other diſtempers put together. And we are credibly informed, that in one dram ſhop only in this town, there are 120 gallons of that accurſed ſpirit, whiſkey, ſold.

1753 September 10, “Historical Chronicle”, in The Gentleman's Magazine, volume XXIII, number VIII, London, page 391:

(Ireland, US, England) A liquor distilled from the fermented mash of grain (as rye, corn, or barley).

(Ireland, US, England) A drink of whiskey.


anticlockwise

(UK, Ireland, Commonwealth, of movement) In a circular fashion so as to be moving to the left at the top of the circle and to the right at the bottom (when viewed from the front), in the opposite direction to the hands of an analog clock.

en el sentit antihorari

in the opposite direction to the hands of an analogue clock

dans le sens inverse des aiguilles d’une montre

საათის ისრის საწინააღმდეგო მიმართულებით

saatis isris sac̣inaaɣmdego mimartulebit moʒravi

საათის ისრის საწინააღმდეგო მიმართულებით მოძრავი

saatis isris saṗirisṗiro mimartulebit moʒravi

საათის ისრის საპირისპირო მიმართულებით მოძრავი

en sentido contrario al movimiento de las agujas de un reloj

སྐོར་ལོག (skor log, literally “the backwards way around”)

ཕྱི་སྐོར (phyi skor, literally “the non-Buddhist way around”)

གཡོན་འཁྱིལ (g.yon 'khyil, literally “left-winding”)


anticlockwise

(Commonwealth, UK, Ireland) In an anticlockwise fashion.

dans le sens contraire des aiguilles d’une montre

en sentido contrario ás agullas do reloxo

antítheta me tin forá ton deiktón tou rologioú

αντίθετα με την φορά των δεικτών του ρολογιού

no sentido contrário aos ponteiros do relógio

en sentido contrario a las agujas del reloj

en sentido contrario a las manecillas del reloj

སྤྱི་སྐོར (spyi skor, literally “the non-Buddhist way around”)


fry

From Middle English fryen, borrowed from Old French frire, from Latin frīgō (“to roast, fry”), from Proto-Indo-European *bʰer-. Cognate with Ancient Greek φρύγω (phrúgō, “I roast, bake”), Sanskrit भृज्जति (bhṛjjati, “to roast, grill, fry”), भृग् (bhṛg, “the crackling of fire”). Replaced native Middle English hirsten, from Old English hierstan (“to fry”).

cog

(Ireland, British, cooking) A meal of fried sausages, bacon, eggs, etc.


turnip

→ German: Turnip

→ Irish: tornapa

→ Russian: турнепс (turneps)

From Middle English turnepe, probably from turn + Middle English nepe, from Old English nǣp, from Latin nāpus. The component turn may be due to the round shape of the plant as though turned on a lathe, or because it must be turned and twisted to be harvested. Cognate to neep. See also parsnip.

Brassica napus
Brassica napus#Translingual

(Scotland, Ireland, Northern England, Cornwall, Atlantic Canada) The yellow root of a related plant, the swede or Brassica napus.


arsehole

en-noun

arsehole (countable and uncountable, plural arseholes)

arseholes (plural)
asshole (alternative)

From Middle English arce-hoole, equivalent to arse + hole. Compare Old English ears-þyrel (“anus”, literally “arse-hole”).

cog

(UK, Ireland, vulgar, uncountable) A variant of the card game big two.


closet

→ Czech: klozet

→ Polish: klozet

→ Spanish: clóset

→ Welsh: closet

From Middle English closet, from Old French closet, from clos (“private space”) + -et (diminutive suffix), from Latin clausum. Equivalent to close + -et, but generally applied in French solely to small open-air enclosures.

cupboard

storage area set into a wall, used for storing food or dishware

wardrobe

piece of furniture, used for storing clothes

cupboard

piece of furniture, used for storing food or dishware

(now chiefly Scotland, Ireland) Any small room or side room.

(US, Philippines) One intended for storing clothes or bedclothes.

(obsolete) Clipping of closet of ease, (later, UK) clipping of water closet: a room containing a toilet.


righto

right-ho (alternative)
righteo (alternative)
rightio (alternative)
right-oh (alternative)
right-o (alternative)

"You can count me in." "It may be really rather formidable. We shall have possibly to tackle a prize-fighter." "Right-o!" said Malone, cheerfully.

1925 July – 1926 May, A[rthur] Conan Doyle, “Which Introduces Some Very Physical Phenomena”, in The Land of Mist (eBook no. 0601351h.html), Australia: Project Gutenberg Australia, published April 2019:

(colloquial, especially British, New Zealand, Australia, Ireland) Okay; all right.


sprog

en-noun

sprog (countable and uncountable, plural sprogs)

1940s, originally service slang. Perhaps from obsolete sprag (“lively young man”), of unknown origin.

To test this hypothesis further, he and his mate Fifer persuaded 16 women, heavy with child, to read a story called The Cat in the Hat to their unborn sprogs, twice a day, during the last few weeks of their pregnancies.

1984 September 13, Donald Gould, Forum: Suck it and see, page 54:

Any guardianship or trusts that you set up when your children were little sprogs may no longer be needed.

2008, Julian Knight, Wills, Probate, & Inheritance Tax For Dummies, UK, unnumbered page:

Kids will love the climbing wall and NZ′s highest vertical slide. If the sprogs get bored with reality, movie make-believe (p232) is right next door.

2010, Brett Atkinson, Sarah Bennett, Scott Kennedy, New Zealand′s South Island, Lonely Planet, page 220:

(UK, Australia, Canada, Ireland, New Zealand, informal, humorous) A child.


quicken

From Middle English quiken (“(chiefly in place names) probably the European rowan or mountain ash (Sorbus aucuparia), and possibly also the aspen (Populus tremula), juniper (genus Juniperus, specifically the common juniper (Juniperus communis)), or service tree (Sorbus domestica)”), possibly from Old English cwician (“to bring to life, vivify; to come to life, become living; to quicken”) (see etymology 1).

inh

[…] Miss Wannop moved off down the path: it was only suited for Indian file, and had on the left hand a ten-foot, untrimmed quicken hedge, the hawthorn blossoms just beginning to blacken at the edges and small green haws to show.

1924 April, Ford Madox Ford, chapter V, in Some Do Not … […] (Parade’s End; 1), 2nd edition, London: Duckworth and Company […], published June 1924, →OCLC, part 1, page 132:

Sorbus aucuparia
Sorbus aucuparia#Translingual

(chiefly Ireland, Northern England) In full quicken tree: the European rowan, rowan, or mountain ash (Sorbus aucuparia).


like

Adjective from Middle English lik, lyk, lich, like, from Old English ġelīċ by shortening, influenced by Old Norse líkr, glíkr; both from Proto-Germanic *galīkaz (“like, similar, same”). Related to alike; more distantly, with lich and -ly. Cognate with West Frisian like (“like; as”), Saterland Frisian gliek (“like”), Danish lig (“alike”), Dutch gelijk (“like, alike”), German gleich (“equal, like”), Icelandic líkur (“alike, like, similar”), Norwegian lik (“like, alike”) Swedish lik (“like, similar”)
Adverb from Middle English like, lyke, liche, lyche, from Old English ġelīċe (“likewise, also, as, in like manner, similarly”) and Old Norse líka (“also, likewise”); both from Proto-Germanic *galīkê, from Proto-Germanic *galīkaz (“same, like, similar”).
Conjunction from Middle English like, lyke, lik, lyk, from the adverb Middle English like.
Preposition from Middle English like, lyke, liche, lyche, lijc, liih (“similar to, like, equal to, comparable with”), from Middle English like (adjective) and like (adverb).

ပေါ့

colloquial: used to precede paraphrased quotations

He was so angry, like.

(colloquial, Scotland, Ireland, Geordie, Teesside, Liverpool) A delayed filler.


bun

buns (plural)
bunn (alternative archaic)

From Middle English bunne (“wheat cake, bun”), from Anglo-Norman bugne (“bump on the head; fritter”), from Old French bugne (hence French beignet), from Frankish *bungjo (“little clump”), diminutive of *bungu (“lump, clump”), from Proto-Germanic *bungô, *bunkô (“clump, lump, heap, crowd”), from Proto-Indo-European *bʰenǵʰ- (“thick, dense, fat”). Cognate with Dutch bonk (“clump, clot, cluster of fruits”). More at bunch.

bolletjie

a small bread roll, often sweetened or spiced

couldn't organise a bun fight in a bakery

Senses referring to baked goods.
(Northern England, Ireland) A cupcake.

Senses referring to baked goods.
A cupcake.


arse

Sranan Tongo: lasi

From Middle English ars, ers, from Old English ærs, ears, from Proto-West Germanic *ars, from Proto-Germanic *arsaz (compare Dutch aars and German Arsch), from Proto-Indo-European *h₁órsos (“backside, buttocks”).

inh

could eat the arse out of a low flying duck

think the sun shines out of someone's arse

“You're an arse,” Ellen said. ¶ “Please? You must like something about me …?” ¶ “I do. You're an arse. I just told you that. I feel comfy with you, because you're such an arse.”

2007, Martin Harrison, The Judgement of Paris, page 282:

He looked at me, was just about to call me an arse, when I told him, “You throw it too hard. Try and think of the javelin hitting the target before you throw it. Let it all go through your mind first, see it, feel it, then throw it.” ¶ “Good advice, you arse,” he said and tried again.

2007, L. A. Wilson, The Silurian: Book One: The Fox and the Bear, page 103:

Felnigg. What a suppurating arse. Look at him. Arse.

2011, Joe Abercrombie, The Heroes, unnumbered page:

(chiefly UK, Ireland, Commonwealth, derogatory, slang) A stupid, pompous, arrogant, mean or despicable person.


filth

From Middle English filth, from Old English fȳlþu, from Proto-West Germanic *fūliþu, equivalent to foul + -th (abstract nominal suffix).

We were in the middle of stashing the money when the filth arrived.

(UK, Ireland, derogatory, slang) The police.


soldier

soldiers (plural)
soldior (alternative obsolete)
soldiour (alternative obsolete)
souldier (alternative obsolete)
souldior (alternative obsolete)
souldiour (alternative obsolete)

Inherited from Middle English soudeour, from Old French soudier or soudeour (“mercenary”), from Medieval Latin soldarius (“soldier (one having pay)”), from Late Latin solidus, a type of coin. Displaced Old English cempa (whence obsolete kemp).
(red herring): An allusion to soldiers' red uniforms; red herring is, reciprocally, a slang term for "soldier".

der

Beside his egg was a plate of buttered toast, already cut up into soldiers.

2008, Nicholas Drayson, A Guide to the Birds of East Africa, page 180:

(British, Australia, Ireland, New Zealand) A piece of buttered bread (or toast), cut into a long thin strip for dipping into a soft-boiled egg.


courgette

Unadapted borrowing from French courgette, diminutive of courge (“vegetable marrow, marrow squash”). Ultimately related to zucchini through the original Latin cucurbita.

ubor

意大利青瓜 (ji³ daai⁶ lei⁶ ceng¹ gwa¹, literally “Italian cucumber”)

Cucurbita pepo
Cucurbita pepo#Translingual

(British, Ireland, uncountable) A particular variety of Cucurbita pepo, a small marrow/squash.


bugger

From Middle English bougre (“heretic”), from Old French bougre, from Medieval Latin Bulgarus (“Bulgar”), from Old Church Slavonic блъгаринъ (blŭgarinŭ, “Bulgarian”), used in designation of heretics (especially the Bogomils, who arose around the 10th century AD in the First Bulgarian Empire), to whom various sexual practices such as anal sex were ascribed. Doublet of Bulgar.

der

Bugger, I've missed the bus.

Dear Lord, forgive me for what I am about to, ah, say in this magnificent place of worship. Bugger. Bugger! Bugger-bugger-bugger-bugger!

1994, Richard Curtis, Four Weddings and a Funeral, spoken by Charles (Hugh Grant):

(slang, British, Ireland, Commonwealth, vulgar) An expression of annoyance or displeasure.


yonks

Unknown. First seen in print around 1960. One theory is that it comes from donkey's ears; another is that it is an abbreviation of years, months and weeks.

Haven’t seen him in yonks!

I’ve been a teacher for yonks–I should really try another career.

This egg is taking yonks to boil.

I rang singer Julie Driscoll […] She said: "I haven't heard from you for yonks[…]"

1968 August 27, Christopher Ward, “The Christopher Ward Page”, in Daily Mirror, London, page 7:

Alas, the comics for that age group have nearly all picture stories today—and of course the ones for younger readers have been that way for yonks (sorry, years).

1975 January 28, Bill Stewart, “Comic Cuts”, in Evening Chronicle, number 30393, Newcastle, page 7:

It's what Miss Brunskill calls ‘our little backwater’. We're more or less fixtures there and have been for yonks.

1982, Alan Bennett, “A Woman of No Importance”, in The Complete Talking Heads, Picador, published 2010, →ISBN, page 14:

“Yonks,” he replies when I ask how long he's been stateside. “It's not like I've become American. I'm in England every year.”

2024 February 17, John Wright, quoting John Lydon, “I terrified a nation. Not bad for an 18-year-old”, in FT Weekend, Life & Arts, page 16:

(slang, UK, Ireland, Commonwealth) A long time (especially a longer time than expected); ages


cad

Short for caddie, from Scots, from French cadet, from dialectal capdet (“chief, captain”), from Latin capitellum, diminutive of caput (“head”).

(UK, Ireland, obsolete, slang) An idle hanger-on about innyards.


yob

LL-Q1860 (eng)-I learned some phrases-yob.wav

Backslang for boy. The second sense was likely influenced by hobnob and/or yokel.

2005 January 10, Melissa Jackson, “Music to deter yobs by”, in BBC News:

Yes, it's holiday time again for British yobs – and the rest of us can flee to those parts of Abroad which the louts ignore, or just cringe in shame at home.

2009 August 8, Janet Daley, “The real reason for all those louts on holiday”, in The Telegraph:

But while doing 70mph on the A1, a hooded yob threw rock^([sic – meaning a rock]) from a grass verge onto the windscreen of the family’s Jeep, causing it to swerve.

2017 March 27, Keiran Southern, “'We could have been killed': Fury at yobs who bricked windscreen with baby girl in car”, in Chronicle Live, retrieved 2017-03-28:

Three local yobs have also joined, but they have not reckoned on a redoubtable Conductor and two local revenue protection officers who soon escort them off the train!

2022 November 2, Paul Bigland, “New trains, old trains, and splendid scenery”, in RAIL, number 969, page 57:

(derogatory, chiefly UK, Ireland, Commonwealth, slang) A person who engages in antisocial behaviour or drunkenness.


gormless

en-adj

gormless (comparative more gormless, superlative most gormless)

more gormless (comparative)
most gormless (superlative)
gaumless (alternative)
gawmless (alternative)

From dialectal English gaum (“heed, attention”) + -less (“without”), from Old Norse gaum, from Proto-Germanic *gaumaz, *gaumō (“heed, attention”). The ‘r’ found in this spelling is a vowel-lengthening device common in non-rhotic dialects of English.

suffix

Did I ever look so stupid: so gormless as Joseph calls it?

1847 December, Ellis Bell [pseudonym; Emily Brontë], chapter XXI, in Wuthering Heights: […], volume (please specify |volume=I or II), London: Thomas Cautley Newby, […], →OCLC:

But Mr. and Mrs. Wormwood were both so gormless and so wrapped up in their own silly little lives that they failed to notice anything unusual about their daughter.

There was a sort of gormless unstoppability about him that she found rather fascinating.

1990, Terry Pratchett, Moving Pictures, page 171:

Hmm. Made an excuse, did he? Not as gormless as he looks in press photographs, then.

2007 July 21, J. K. Rowling [pseudonym; Joanne Rowling], “The Wedding, Auntie Muriel”, in Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows (Harry Potter; 7), London: Bloomsbury Publishing, →ISBN, page 141:

“Don’t just stand there looking gormless. There’s plenty of work to do in the back.”

2015, Adele Abbott, Witch Is When Everything Went Crazy, page 33:

(chiefly UK, Commonwealth, Ireland, of a person) Lacking intelligence, sense or understanding; foolish.

vypatlaný

lacking intelligence or understanding; foolish


rapparee

from Irish rapaire, variant of ropaire (“cutpurse”).

And then he would relate stories of banshees, and robberies, and ghosts, and hair-breadth escapes, and 'rapparees,' and adventures in the wars of King James, which he heard told in his nonage by the old folk, long vanished, who remembered those troubles.

1863, Sheridan Le Fanu, The House by the Churchyard:

(Ireland, historical or archaic) A bandit or brigand.


rasher

Unknown origin. Said to be an alteration of rasure.

He was a man who made his tent comfortable wherever he pitched it, and long before Altamont’s arrival, had done justice to a copious breakfast of fried eggs and broiled rashers, which Mr. Grady had prepared secundum artem.

1848 November – 1850 December, William Makepeace Thackeray, chapter 44, in The History of Pendennis. […], volume (please specify |volume=I or II), London: Bradbury and Evans, […], published 1849–1850, →OCLC:

He received us in his quietly genial fashion, ordered fresh rashers and eggs, and joined us in a hearty meal.

1892, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, “The Adventure of the Engineer's Thumb”, in The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes, Wikisource:

He toasted his bacon on a fork and caught the drops of fat on his bread; then he put the rasher on his thick slice of bread, and cut off chunks with a clasp-knife, poured his tea into his saucer, and was happy.

1913, D[avid] H[erbert] Lawrence, chapter 2, in Sons and Lovers, London: Duckworth & Co. […], →OCLC:

Would you like a bite of something? None of your damned lawdeedaw airs here. The rich of a rasher fried with a herring?

1922 February, James Joyce, “[III]”, in Ulysses, Paris: Shakespeare and Company, […], →OCLC:

Thick-cut, thin-cut or flavoured, sometimes there is nothing nicer than a rasher on toast or a crispy rasher as part of a full fry up.

2010 March 25, “Put to the test: Back rashers”, in Irish Independent:

(UK, Ireland) A strip of bacon; a piece of bacon.

Now another layer of forcemeat, then rashers of ham, then forcemeat. Cover the surface with three rashers of fat bacon and a bayleaf; cover with paste, and bake for two hours in a moderate oven, covering the top with a piece of[…]

1874, John Charles Buckmaster, Buckmaster's Cookery: Being an Abridgment of Some of the Lectures Delivered in the Cookery School at the International Exhibition for 1873 and 1874 : Together with a Collection of Approved Recipes and Menus, page 172:

“A pound of tea at one-and-three, / And a pot of raspberry jam, Two new-laid eggs, a dozen pegs, / And a pound of rashers of ham.”

1896, Henry Davenport Northrop, Joseph R. Gay, Irvine Garland Penn, The College of Life Or Practical Self: A Manual of Self-improvement for the Colored Race ... Giving Examples and Achievements of Successful Men and Women of the Race ... Including Afro, page 622:

On March 24 : For breakfast - cocoa, two rashers of bacon, 2 oz. of dry oatmeal, and 1 oz. of cream. For dinner - 2 oz. of cooked meat, […]

1916, Royal Society of Medicine (Great Britain), Proceedings of the Royal Society of Medicine, page 54:

We could see the circus performers eating tremendous breakfasts, with all the savage relish of their power and strength: they ate big fried steaks, pork chops, rashers of bacon, a half dozen eggs, great slabs of fried ham and great[…]

1989 May 1, Thomas Wolfe, Francis E. Skipp, The Complete Short Stories Of Thomas Wolfe, Simon and Schuster, →ISBN, page 203:

12 rashers of British smoked dry-cured streaky bacon

2017 February 16, Sarah Randell, A Pot of Marmalade: The ultimate guide to making and cooking with marmalade, Saltyard Books, →ISBN:

Reggie pulls out a rasher of beef jerky from his back pocket and pulls off a bite with a distinct “Snap!” He then sits down next to Siggy, opposite the two girls.

(Can we date this quote?), Joe Romanoski, Michelle Randell, The Farborough Scare, Lulu.com, →ISBN, page 76:

(UK, Ireland) A strip, a piece (of something, such as ham, bacon, etc).


gaff

Unknown. Possibly from Etymology 1, via a sense of “a place that will be robbed” in criminal argot; possibly from Etymology 2, via a sense of "cheap theatre"; possibly from Romani gav (“village”) (whence German Kaff (“village”)).

We're going round to Mike's gaff later to watch the footie.

"Steady on, mate. How was I to know this was your gaff? I was lookin' for somewhere to kip."

1971, Richard Carpenter, Catweazle and the Magic Zodiac, Harmondsworth: Puffin Books, page 56:

And like I said, I was so fuck-faced that I forgot I'd moved and let myself back into my old gaff.

1993, Tristan Hawkins, Pepper, London: Flamingo, →ISBN, page 106:

Am I alone in feeling smug (if slatternly) about the news that super-clean homes are a breeding ground for infection? Apparently, all that bleach is bad not just for germs but for children's immune systems, too, and paradoxically causes more disease than it prevents. Not round my gaff. Oh no. My standards of housekeeping are so abysmally low that my eldest daughter was three years old before she even developed a temperature.

2015 April 4, Judith Woods, “I knew it! Spring cleaning is bad for your family's health [print version: Vindicated at last! It's healthier to be a slatternly housewife, p. 28]”, in The Daily Telegraph, archived from the original on 2015-04-09:

Man will enter the gaf with crown
Gun shot spin his head right round

2019 April 30, “The Godfather”, Ink (lyrics), 0:37–0:40:

The term ‘free gaf’ is music to any teenage ears in Dublin, while the term ‘wreak the gaf’ should fill any parent with dread. The term ‘gaf’ means ‘house,’ so when parents are away […]

2019 November 7, Erike Sanker, “20 mad Dublin slang phrases that only make sense to locals”, in Ireland Before You Die (IB4UD):

(Ireland; British, especially Dublin, Manchester, MLE, Cockney and Glaswegian; slang) A place of residence.

especially Dublin; Manchester; especially Dublin; Manchester


Blueshirt

(Ireland, historical, 1930s) A member of an Irish fascist organization led by Eoin O'Duffy.

(Ireland, derogatory) Any person accused of supporting right-wing Irish nationalism or fascism.

(Ireland, derogatory) A member of Ireland's Fine Gael political party, which O'Duffy's followers joined after their own organization was dissolved.


Michaelmas

Michaelmases (plural)
Mihilmas (alternative obsolete)

From Middle English Michelmasse, Myghelmesse; equivalent to Michael + -mas.

(UK, Ireland, law, education) Ellipsis of Michaelmas term.


manoeuvre

From Middle French manœuvre (“manipulation, manoeuvre”) and manouvrer (“to manoeuvre”), from Old French manovre (“handwork, manual labour”), from Medieval Latin manopera, manuopera (“work done by hand, handwork”), from manu (“by hand”) + operari (“to work”). First recorded in the Capitularies of Charlemagne (800 AD) to mean "chore, manual task", probably as a calque of the Frankish *handwerc (“hand-work”). Compare Old English handweorc, Old English handġeweorc, German Handwerk.

der

The system also reacts to unexpected traffic situations and handles them independently by employing evasive manoeuvres within the lane or by braking manoeuvres

2021, “Mercedes-Benz self-driving car technology approved for use”, in Fleet news:

UK, Canada, Ireland, South Africa, Australia, and New Zealand spelling of maneuver.


manoeuvre

en-verb

manoeuvre (third-person singular simple present manoeuvres, present participle manoeuvring, simple past and past participle manoeuvred)

manoeuvres (present singular third-person)
manoeuvring (participle present)
manoeuvred (participle past)
manoeuvred (past)

Three pairs of double doors are provided on each side, wide enough to take pallet trucks, and strengthened floors to allow the trucks to manoeuvre inside the vehicle.

1959 November, “Talking of Trains: S.R. Motor Luggage Vans”, in Trains Illustrated, page 523:

(transitive) UK, Canada, Ireland, South Africa, Australia, and New Zealand spelling of maneuver.


press

en-noun

press (countable and uncountable, plural presses)

From Middle English presse (“throng, crowd, clothespress”), partially from Old English press (“clothespress”) (from Medieval Latin pressa) and from Old French presse (Modern French presse) from Old French presser (“to press”), from Latin pressāre, from pressus, past participle of premere (“to press”). Displaced native Middle English thring (“press, crowd, throng”) (from Old English þring (“a press, crowd, anything that presses or confines”)).

cog

Put the cups in the press.

Put the ironing in the linen press.

But then I had the [massive] flintlock by me for protection. ¶[…]The linen-press and a chest on the top of it formed, however, a very good gun-carriage; and, thus mounted, aim could be taken out of the window at the old mare feeding in the meadow below by the brook, and a 'bead' could be drawn upon Molly, the dairymaid, kissing the fogger behind the hedge,[…].

1879, R[ichard] J[efferies], chapter 1, in The Amateur Poacher, London: Smith, Elder, & Co., […], →OCLC:

(countable, especially in Ireland and Scotland) An enclosed storage space (e.g. closet, cupboard).


Troubles

Under McGlinchey's leadership, the INLA committed several atrocities and murders during the Troubles, resulting in the Co Derry native's imprisonment both north and south of the border.

2023 August 1, “Son of slain republicans brings actions”, in The Irish Times, page 4:

(Ireland, historical) The continued violence and terrorist, military and paramilitary activity in Northern Ireland that happened from the mid 1960s to the late 1990s.

na Trioblóidí

violence in Northern Ireland, 1960s–1990s


yill

en-verb

yill (third-person singular simple present yills, present participle yilling, simple past and past participle yilled)

yills (present singular third-person)
yilling (participle present)
yilled (participle past)
yilled (past)


duvet

From French duvet, from Middle French duvet, from Old French duvet (“down, the feathers of young birds”), alteration of dumet, dumect, which in turn derives from dum, dun (“down, feathers”), from Old Norse dúnn (“down, down feather”), from Proto-Germanic *dūnaz (“down”), from Proto-Indo-European *dʰewh₂- (“to smoke, fume, raise dust”).
Cognate with Icelandic dúnn (“down”), Danish dun (“down”), German Daune (“down”), Dutch dons (“down”). More at down.

der

(British, Ireland, New Zealand, Canada) A quilt or usually flat cloth bag with a filling (traditionally down) and usually an additional washable cover, used instead of blankets; often called a comforter or quilt, especially in US English.


on the piss

From on (“regularly taking”) + the + slang piss (“any alcoholic drink”).

We're going out on the piss tonight. Want to come?

Life is meaningless, when I've been on the piss.

2008, Colin Shaddick, Isn't Sex Noisy, →ISBN, page 50:

(UK, Ireland, Commonwealth, slang, vulgar) Drinking alcoholic beverages to excess.


The form number designated by Britain's HM Revenue and Customs department.

2012, Forbes, Has Unconventional Oil Production Peaked?
Get any concessions wrong in advanced markets, and CEO’s know they’ll pay a very heavy price on stock markets. ‘P45’s’ all round, and that’s before we consider any national flags involved, or the small fact that host nations are piling on pressure to get pumps working, donkey’s nodding and receipts rolling in.

(UK, Ireland) A form that an employee receives when they terminate their employment, detailing income for social security and taxation purposes for the current financial year.


story

what's the story (alternative)
what's the story, bud (alternative)
story, bud (alternative)

Alternative form of what's the story (“how are you?”)

*Any non-Irish person should be aware that it is not necessary to take the question literally i.e. one shouldn't start to explain your life story when greeted with 'What's the story?' rather they should respond in kind e.g. Greeting: 'What's the story?' Response: 'What's the story?' There are several variations on the theme, the most popular being 'What's the story, bud?' or the pithy : 'Story, bud?' or the pithier still 'Story?'

2012, Colin Murphy, Donal O'Dea, “18 - Saying 'What's the story?'”, in More Stuff Irish People Love, 2017 edition, The O'Brien Press Ltd, →ISBN:

(idiomatic, Ireland, Dublin) Used as a greeting, short for what's the story?


eejit

eejits (plural)
eedjit (alternative)
eegit (alternative)
eejut (alternative)
ijjit (alternative)
ijut (alternative)

Hiberno-English and Scottish English pronunciation of idiot.

(Ireland, Scotland, Mid-Ulster, derogatory) An idiot; a fool; an imbecile.


cute hoor

From cute (“sly/clever, shrewd or perceptive”) and whore.

(Ireland, slang) A shrewd scoundrel, especially in business or politics.


haem

en-noun

haem (countable and uncountable, plural haems)

Haem is ubiquitous, abundant and necessary for energy metabolism. Most bacteria have a haem biosynthesis pathway, but nevertheless, since haem is a major source of iron (an essential metal), microbes take up exogenous haem to retrieve iron.

2010, Pierre Cornelis, Simon Andrews (editors), Iron Uptake and Homeostasis in Microorganisms, page 17:

Australia, Canada, Ireland, New Zealand, South Africa, and UK standard spelling of heme.


petrolhead

2004, Roger Austin Learmonth, Petrolhead: The Life and Times of a Classic Car Buff, →ISBN:

2009, Stuart Prebble, Grumpy Old Drivers: The Official Handbook, unnumbered page,
In the early years it had been very much a series for people I believe are known by the curiously unappealing term ‘petrolheads’. Since most petrolheads are probably out in the evenings, burning up the rubber or the tarmac or whatever it is that petrolheads do, the show had a fairly limited audience.

(colloquial, UK, Ireland) A car enthusiast.


pisshead

(UK, Commonwealth, Ireland, derogatory, vulgar, slang) A person who regularly overindulges in alcoholic drink.


pad

From Dutch pad or Middle Low German pat (“path”). Doublet of path.

And when the map shows that the creek will no longer take him where he wants to go, then he looks for an animal pad and follows it, getting down on his belly and wriggling under thorny bush when he has to.

1999, Julia Leigh, The Hunter, Faber & Faber 2012, p. 36

(British dialectal, Australia, Ireland) A path, particularly one unformed or unmaintained; a track made by animals.