I found this list of olde words while I was uhtceare. Maybe we should resurrect some of them?

1. Owl jacket

A jacket left on the back of a chair at work, so it looks as though you are in the office working, rather than skiving.

2. Flype

Old English word meaning to roll up your socks or stockings before putting them on. Still survives in Scotland.

3. Leper juice

Medical term referring to pus. Fell out of use due to its general horribleness.

4. Vizzying-hole

Scots word for a peephole, derived from the Old French word, visée, meaning ‘look’.

5. Uhtceare

Old English word meaning to lie awake anxiously before dawn. Literally translated, it means ‘dawn-care’.

6. Sloom

To gently sleep or lightly slumber, from the Middle English slumen and the Old English slūmian.

7. Biffin

A deep red cooking apple. Derives from ‘beefing’, in reference to the colour of the fruit. People would often exchange biffins at Christmastime.

8. Gongoozler

A person who likes to mindlessly stare (at anything). The word survives in and around the canal boat community to this day.

9. Snollygoster

19th-century American term for an unprincipled, dishonest person, especially a politician.

10. Mumpsimus

An obstinate person who holds on rigidly to a certain set of beliefs even though they are disproved. The term may have been coined by Erasmus.

11. Wamblecropt

To have digestive issues that are so severe that you can’t move.

12. Groke

Old Scots word originally used to describe dogs staring longingly at food, and extended to refer to humans.

13. Trullibubs

A person’s entrails. Can also be an insulting term aimed at an overweight person.

14. Sprunt

Victorian-era Scottish word meaning to chase girls around a haystack after dark. Possibly a combination of ‘spring’ and ‘hunt’.

Categories: Wordy humour

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