The English Gipsies and Their Language Part 8

PAL is a common cant word for brother or friend, and it is purely Gipsy, having come directly from that language, without the slightest change. On the Continent it is _prala_, or _pral_. In England it sometimes takes the form "_pel_."

TRASH is derived by Mr Wedgwood (Dictionary of English Etymology, 1872) from the old word _trousse_, signifying the clipping of trees. But in old Gipsy or in the German Gipsy of the present day, as in the Turkish Rommany, it means so directly "fear, mental weakness and worthlessness,"

that it may possibly have had a Rommany origin. Terror in Gipsy is _trash_, while thirst is _trush_, and both are to be found in the Hindustani. _Tras_, which means _thirst_ and _alarm_ or _terror_.

It should be observed that in no instance can these Gipsy words have been borrowed from English slang. They are all to be found in German Gipsy, which is in its turn identical with the Rommany language of India--of the Nats, Bhazeghurs, Doms, Multanee or Banjoree, as I find the primitive wandering Gipsies termed by different writers.

I am aware that the word CAD was applied to the conductor of an omnibus, or to a non-student at Universities, before it became a synonym for vulgar fellow, yet I believe that it was abbreviated from cadger, and that this is simply the Gipsy word Gorgio, which often means a man in the abstract. I have seen this word printed as gorger in English slang.

CODGER, which is common, is applied, as Gipsies use the term Gorgio, contemptuously, and it sounds still more like it.

BOSH, signifying nothing, or in fact empty humbug, is generally credited to the Turkish language, but I can see no reason for going to the Turks for what the Gipsies at home already had, in all probability, from the same Persian source, or else from the Sanskrit. With the Gipsies, _bosh_ is a fiddle, music, noise, barking, and very often an idle sound or nonsense. "Stop your bosherin," or "your bosh," is what they would term _flickin lav_, or current phrase.

"BATS," a low term for a pair of boots, especially bad ones, is, I think, from the Gipsy and Hindustani _pat_, a foot, generally called, however, by the Rommany in England, Tom Pats. "To pad the hoof," and "to stand pad "--the latter phrase meaning to stand upright, or to stand and beg, are probably derived from _pat_. It should be borne in mind that Gipsies, in all countries, are in the habit of changing certain letters, so that _p_ and _b_, like _l_ and _n_, or _k_ and _g_ hard, may often be regarded as identical.

"CHEE-CHEE," "be silent!" or "fie," is termed "Anglo-Indian," by the author of the Slang Dictionary, but we need not go to India of the present day for a term which is familiar to every Gipsy and "traveller"

in England, and which, as Mr Simson discovered long ago, is an excellent "spell" to discourage the advances of thimble-riggers and similar gentry, at fairs, or in public places.

CHEESE, or "THE CHEESE," meaning that anything is pre-eminent or superior; in fact, "the thing," is supposed by many to be of gipsy origin because Gipsies use it, and it is to be found as "chiz" in Hindustani, in which language it means a thing. Gipsies do not, however, seem to regard it themselves, as _tacho_ or true Rommanis, despite this testimony, and I am inclined to think that it partly originated in some wag's perversion of the French word _chose_.

In London, a man who sells cutlery in the streets is called a CHIVE FENCER, a term evidently derived from the Gipsy _chiv_, a sharp-pointed instrument or knife. A knife is also called a _chiv_ by the lowest cla.s.s all over England.

COUTER or COOTER is a common English slang term for a guinea. It was not necessary for the author of the Slang Dictionary to go to the banks of the Danube for the origin of a word which is in the mouths of all English Gipsies, and which was brought to England by their ancestors. A sovereign, a pound, in Gipsy, is a _bar_.

A GORGER, meaning a gentleman, or well-dressed man, and in theatrical parlance, a manager, is derived by the author of the Slang Dictionary--absurdly enough, it must be confessed--from "gorgeous,"--a word with which it has no more in common than with gouges or chisels. A gorger or gorgio--the two are often confounded--is the common Gipsy word for one who is not Gipsy, and very often means with them a _rye_ or gentleman, and indeed any man whatever. Actors sometimes call a fellow- performer a _cully-gorger_.

d.i.c.k, an English slang word for sight, or seeing, is purely Gipsy in its origin, and in common use by Rommanis over all the world.

DOOK, to tell fortunes, and DOOKING, fortune-telling, are derived by the writer last cited, correctly enough, from the Gipsy _dukkerin_,--a fact which I specify, since it is one of the very rare instances in which he has not blundered when commenting on Rommany words, or other persons'

works.

Mr Borrow has told us that a TANNER or sixpence, sometimes called a Downer, owes its pseudonym to the Gipsy word _tawno_ or _tano_, meaning "little"--the sixpence being the little coin as compared with a shilling.

DRUM or DROM, is the common English Gipsy word for a road. In English slang it is applied, not only to highways, but also to houses.

If the word GIBBERISH was, as has been a.s.serted, first applied to the language of the Gipsies, it may have been derived either from "Gip," the nickname for Gipsy, with _ish_ or _rish_ appended as in Engl-_ish_, I- _rish_, or from the Rommany word _Jib_ signifying a language.

KEN, a low term for a house, is possibly of Gipsy origin. The common word in every Rommany dialect for a house is, however, neither ken nor khan, but _Ker_.

LIL, a book, a letter, has pa.s.sed from the Gipsies to the low "Gorgios,"

though it is not a very common word. In Rommany it can be _correctly_ applied only to a letter or a piece of paper, which is written on, though English Gipsies call all books by this name, and often speak of a letter as a _Chinamangri_.

LOUR or LOWR, and LOAVER, are all vulgar terms for money, and combine two Gipsy words, the one _lovo_ or _lovey_, and the other _loure_, to steal.

The reason for the combination or confusion is obvious. The author of the Slang Dictionary, in order to explain this word, goes as usual to the Wallachian Gipsies, for what he might have learned from the first tinker in the streets of London. I should remark on the word loure, that Mr Borrow has shown its original ident.i.ty with _loot_, the Hindustani for plunder or booty.

I believe that the American word loafer owes something to this Gipsy root, as well as to the German _laufer_ (_landlaufer_), and Mexican Spanish _galeofar_, and for this reason, that when the term first began to be popular in 1834 or 1835, I can distinctly remember that it meant to _pilfer_. Such, at least, is my earliest recollection, and of hearing school boys ask one another in jest, of their acquisitions or gifts, "Where did you loaf that from?" A petty pilferer was a loafer, but in a very short time all of the tribe of loungers in the sun, and disreputable pickers up of unconsidered trifles, now known as b.u.mmers, were called loafers. On this point my memory is positive, and I call attention to it, since the word in question has been the subject of much conjecture in America.

It is a very curious fact, that while the word _loot_ is unquestionably Anglo-Indian, and only a recent importation into our English "slanguage,"

it has always been at the same time English-Gipsy, although it never rose to the surface.

MAUNDER, to stroll about and beg, has been derived from _Mand_, the Anglo- Saxon for a basket, but is quite as likely to have come from Maunder, the Gipsy for "to beg." Mumper, a beggar, is also from the same source.

MOKE, a donkey, is _said_ to be Gipsy, by Mr Hotten, but Gipsies themselves do not use the word, nor does it belong to their usual language. The proper Rommany word for an a.s.s is _myla_.

PARNY, a vulgar word for rain, is supposed to have come into England from the "Anglo-Indian" source, but it is more likely that it was derived from the Gipsy _panni_ or water. "Brandy p.a.w.nee" is undoubtedly an Anglo-Indian word, but it is used by a very different cla.s.s of people from those who know the meaning of _Parny_.

POSH, which has found its way into vulgar popularity, as a term for small coins, and sometimes for money in general, is the diminutive of the Gipsy word _pashero_ or _poshero_, a half-penny, from _pash_ a half, and _haura_ or _harra_, a penny.

QUEER, meaning across, cross, contradictory, or bad, is "supposed" to be the German word _quer_, introduced by the Gipsies. In their own language _atut_ means across or against, though to _curry_ (German and Turkish Gipsy _kurava_), has some of the slang meaning attributed to _queer_. An English rogue will say, "to shove the queer," meaning to pa.s.s counterfeit money, while the Gipsy term would be to _chiv wafri lovvo_, or _lovey_.

"RAGLAN, a married woman, originally _Gipsy_, but now a term with English tramps" (_The Slang Dictionary_, _London_ 1865). In Gipsy, _raklo_ is a youth or boy, and _rakli_, a girl; Arabic, _ragol_, a man. I am informed, on good authority, that these words are known in India, though I cannot find them in dictionaries. They are possibly transposed from _Lurka_ a youth and _lurki_ a girl, such transpositions being common among the lowest cla.s.ses in India.

RUMMY or RUMY, as applied to women, is simply the Gipsy word _romi_, a contraction of _romni_, a wife; the husband being her _rom_.

BIVVY for beer, has been derived from the Italian _bevere_, but it is probably Gipsy, since in the old form of the latter language, Biava or Piava, means to drink. To _pivit_, is still known among English Gipsies.

RIGS--running one's rigs is said to be Gipsy, but the only meaning of _rig_, so far as I am able to ascertain in Rommany, is _a side_ or _an edge_. It is, however, possible that one's _side_ may in earlier times have been equivalent to "face, or encounter." To _rikker_ or _rigger_ in Gipsy, is to carry anything.

MOLL, a female companion, is probably merely the nickname for Mary, but it is worth observing, that _Mal_ in old Gipsy, or in German Gipsy, means an a.s.sociate, and Mahar a wife, in Hindustani.

STASH, to be quiet, to stop, is, I think, a variation of the common Gipsy word hatch, which means precisely the same thing, and is derived from the older word _atchava_.

STURABAN, a prison, is purely Gipsy. Mr Hotten says it is from the Gipsy _distarabin_, but there is no such word beginning with _dis_, in the English Rommany dialect. In German Gipsy a prison is called _stillapenn_.

TINY or TEENY has been derived from the Gipsy _tano_, meaning "little."

TOFFER, a woman who is well dressed in new clean clothes, probably gets the name from the Gipsy _tove_, to wash (German Gipsy _Tovava_). She is, so to speak, freshly washed. To this cla.s.s belong Toff, a dandy; _Tofficky_, dressy or gay, and _Toft_, a dandy or swell.

TOOL as applied to stealing, picking pockets, and burglary, is, like _tool_, to drive with the reins; derived beyond doubt from the Gipsy word _tool_, to take or hold. In all the Continental Rommany dialects it is _Tulliwawa_.

PUNCH, it is generally thought, is Anglo-Indian, derived directly from the Hindustani _Pantch_ or five, from the five ingredients which enter into its composition, but it may have partially got its name from some sporting Gipsy in whose language the word for _five_ is the same as in Sanskrit. There have been thousands of "swell" Rommany chals who have moved in sporting circles of a higher cla.s.s than they are to be found in at the present day.

"VARDO formerly was _Old Cant_ for a waggon" (_The Slang Dictionary_). It may be added that it is pure Gipsy, and is still known at the present day to every Rom in England. In Turkish Gipsy, _Vordon_ means a vehicle, in German Gipsy, _Wortin_.

"Can you VOKER Rommany?" is given by Mr Hotten as meaning "Can you speak Gipsy,"--but there is no such word in Rommany as _voker_. He probably meant "Can you _rakker_"--p.r.o.nounced very often _Roker_. Continental Gipsy _Rakkervava_. Mr Hotten derives it from the Latin _Vocare_!

I do not know the origin of WELCHER, a betting cheat, but it is worthy of remark that in old Gipsy a _Walshdo_ or Welsher meant a Frenchman (from the German Walsch) or any foreigner of the Latin races.

YACK, a watch, probably received its name from the Gipsy _Yak_ an eye, in the old times when watches were called bull's eyes.

LUSHY, to be tipsy, and LUSH, are attributed for their origin to the name of Lushington, a once well-known London brewer, but when we find _Losho_ and _Loshano_ in a Gipsy dialect, meaning jolly, from such a Sanskrit root as _Lush_; as Paspati derives it, there seems to be some ground for supposing the words to be purely Rommany. Dr Johnson said of lush that it was "opposite to pale," and this curiously enough shows its first source, whether as a "slang" word or as indicative of colour, since one of its early Sanskrit meanings is _light_ or _radiance_. This ident.i.ty of the so regarded vulgar and the refined, continually confronts us in studying Rommany.

"To make a MULL of anything," meaning thereby to spoil or confuse it, if it be derived, as is said, from the Gipsy, must have come from _Mullo_ meaning _dead_, and the Sanskrit _Mara_. There is, however, no such Gipsy word as mull, in the sense of entangling or spoiling.

PROSS is a theatrical slang word, meaning to instruct and train a tyro.

As there are several stage words of manifest Gipsy origin, I am inclined to derive this from the old Gipsy _Priss_, to read. In English Gipsy _Pra.s.ser_ or _Pross_ means to ridicule or scorn. Something of this is implied in the slang word _Pross_, since it also means "to sponge upon a comrade," &c., "for drink."

TOSHERS are in English low language, "men who steal copper from ship's bottoms." I cannot form any direct connection between this word and any in English Gipsy, but it is curious that in Turkish Gipsy _Tasi_ is a cup, and in Turkish Persian it means, according to Paspati, a copper basin used in the baths. It is as characteristic of English Gipsy as of any of its cognate dialects, that we often find lurking in it the most remarkable Oriental fragments, which cannot be directly traced through the regular line of transmission.

UP TO TRAP means, in common slang, intelligent. It is worth observing, that in Gipsy, _drab_ or _trap_ (which words were p.r.o.nounced alike by the first Gipsies who came from Germany to England), is used for medicine or poison, and the employment of the latter is regarded, even at the present, as the greatest Rommany secret. Indeed, it is only a few days since a Gipsy said to me, "If you know _drab_, you're up to everything; for there's nothing goes above that." With _drab_ the Gipsy secures game, fish, pigs, and poultry; he quiets kicking horses until they can be sold; and last, not least, kills or catches rats and mice. As with the Indians of North America, _medicine_--whether to kill or cure--is to the Gipsy the art of arts, and those who affect a knowledge of it are always regarded as the most intelligent. It is, however, remarkable, that the Gipsy, though he lives in fields and woods, is, all the world over, far inferior to the American Indian as regards a knowledge of the properties of herbs or minerals. One may pick the first fifty plants which he sees in the woods, and show them to the first Indian whom he meets, with the absolute certainty that the latter will give him a name for every one, and describe in detail their qualities and their use as remedies. The Gipsy seldom has a name for anything of the kind. The country people in America, and even the farmers' boys, have probably inherited by tradition much of this knowledge from the aborigines.