Something Rhymes with Purple - Hooch

Episode Date: December 14, 2021

Recorded live in front of 1000 Purple People at the Chichester Festival Theatre, in this episode we get our claws into the rich language of the 1920s. From sipping gimlets in speakeasys to getting a shingle to go with our plus fours we skip through a decade that gave so many unique phrases to the English language. No hokum, it really is the bees-knees.  There are lots of theatrical anecdotes from Gyles as he’s in a theatre very close to his heart and our lovely audience come up with some very inventive definitions for Susie’s Trio.  A Somethin' Else production.  To buy SRWP mugs and more head to.... https://kontraband.shop/collections/something-rhymes-with-purple  If you would like to sign up to Apple Subs please follow this link https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/something-rhymes-with-purple/id1456772823 and make sure that you are running the most up-to-date IOS on your computer/device otherwise it won’t work.  If you would like to see Gyles and Susie LIVE and in person on our Something Rhymes With Purple UK Tour then please go to https://www.tiltedco.com/somethingrhymeswithpurple for tickets and more information. Susie’s Trio: Pettitoes – pig’s trotters served as a delicacy Skimmington – a procession used to make an example of a nagging wife Gasconade – extravagant boasting and strutting Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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skip to the good bit using the card member entrance. Let's go seize the night. That's the powerful backing of American Express. Visit amex.ca slash yamex. Benefits vary by card. Other conditions apply. Something else. Welcome to Something Rhymes with Purple, live from Chichester.

Thank you for joining us. So we're coming to the end of 2021 and we thought we would go all the way back to 1921 to dig in to the fantastic slang and linguistic creations of the 1920s. It was, as you will see, Giles, I think, a really fertile time for new words and phrases. Good. That are still around today? That are still around today, yes. Well, some of them, of course, won't seem as old to me as they do to you, because I am a little

bit older than you. I was telling the audience before we pressed the button that says record for our podcast that I first came to this theatre, because we're giving this live podcast from the Chichester Festival Theatre in Sussex, that was founded at the beginning of the 1960s by Sir Laurence Olivier. And I was a schoolboy nearby and came to all the early productions here. And I realised that 1961 is now 60 years ago. And you're going to talk about words from the 1920s, that when 1961 was only 40 years before. So this old-fashioned lingo is going to seem like sort of modern jargon to me.

But let's cope with it. Give us some examples of the kind of language you're talking about. Okay, so I think what you will mostly find is a real sense of zest and zing and a sort of fervour for life, really, because obviously this is a post-war period, almost post-war hedonism is what you'll feel now. New dances, there was the Black Bottom, for example, the Charleston, of course, the Camel Walk,

the Hebe Jebes, which began as a dance. Hello, I've heard of the Black Bottom. I've heard of the Charleston, I've not heard of the other two. What are the other two? OK, so there's the Camel Walk. The Camel Walk. Gives you the hump. Thank you. The Hebe Jebes. I've not heard of the Hebe Jebes either. Okay. Well, you've heard of having the Hebe Jebes. Yes. What's the origin of that? Having the Hebe Jebes, we actually don't know. It's origin unknown in the dictionary, but it's just one of... Do you remember all those

wonderful rhyming reduplicative compounds, is what we call them? Like shilly-shally, willy-nilly. Rhyming reduplicative compounds. Yes, they're not always rhyming, because with things like dilly-dally, do you remember the rule of Ablaut reduplication? No. No, no, we're not familiar.

Some people are taking A-level at the back, maybe, but I'm not. Explain that to me. Well, the thing about my job, sorry, I've got my back to you here, I'm sorry. The thing about my job is that it is just the most brilliant gig that you can possibly find, but it involves the worst kind of terminology in terms of putting people off. So the wonderful databases that we look at all the time which have got text messages scholarly journals tabloid newspapers you know transcripts of conversations on the street they're called corpora um corpora corpora corpus you know anyway the ablout reduplication rule

and you know we don't have many rules in english is is all about sound so this is why you don't wear flop flips remember or dally dilly or eat a cat kit or play pong ping there's a reason it's flip flops not flop flips yeah it's a sound thing um and uh that is slightly involved in the heebie-jeebies thing if there was a switch because you're absolutely right it should be actually flop flip shouldn't it because it goes flop flip it doesn't go flip flop it goes flop flip how intriguing anyway i just thought i'd throw that in no but it is and the heebie jeebies is like that sort of like that i mean that's the sort of that is a rhyming with duplicative compound so you don't have a vowel shift in that one um lots of new drinks so gimlets we have a gimlet yes i've heard of a gimlet okay that's gin and lime juice gin and lime juice yes and i think

it's i mean the gimlet the tool is a boring tool isn't it so maybe it balls into you and just knocks you over it's a boring drink as well as i recall cocktail bars those were that first mention of a cocktail bar was 1926 hold on was the cocktail invented in the 20s as well so the cocktail itself people were drinking a long time before but the first instance of a cocktail bar that you can find in the OED is in 1926. Do you remember, cocktail is a real etymological mystery, we don't quite know, but our nearest and best guess is that it comes from the little rooster feathers that people used to put in the fashionable drinks, literally the tail of a cockerel, not a real one. Mae'n dod o'r llythyr ffwrdd y byddai pobl yn eu rhoi i mewn i'r ffrindiau ffasiynau. Yn llythyr, y teulu o'r cockerol. Nid yw'n un gwirioneddol.

Mae'n werth ddweud hyn. Mae'n ddiddorol i mi sut lawer o geiriau nad ydym yn gallu eu trafod yn unig. Yn unig y gair syml, rydych chi'n ei roi'n aml yn y cyfrif hwn. Ydy'n ddog? Ddog. Ni'n gwybod yr arbenigedd, y defnydd cyntaf o ddog. Beth mae'r ddog... Rydym yn gwybod canine ac hwnnw, ond ond gallwn greu'r arbennig o ddogion. Felly, yn gyffredinol â'r coctail. Iawn, fe ddod o gwmpas. Rwy'n rhoi mwy. Felly, ymddiriedaeth personol.

Felly, dyma'r amser, fel y dwi'n ei ddweud, o geisio cyflwyno rhai rhamadwyr yn i'r bywyd. Felly, fe fyddwch chi'n gweld y sgynll, a oedd yna ddwy lles gwych, a dwi'n meddwl ei fod yn cynnwys gwahanol lawer, ac yn ymwneud â sgynllau ar y cool haircut which I think involved various layers hence shingles on the back the eton crop as well can I say something yes train that they should call her I mean shingles is such an unpleasant thing what kind of a hairdresser would say madam would you like the shingles I don't think so how strange should have called it herpes zoster herpes zoster yeah is that another name for the shingles yes but these shingles are the roof shingles very good i think is the idea um plus fours have you ever worn a pair of plus fours in my dreams okay i have a fantasy life as being a character out of pg woodhouse in which i would wear plus fours go on i can imagine why are they called plus fours

do you know i actually don't know the answer to that. This is a time when I should be looking up in the OEDs. I would in the podcast. Why would they be called plus fours? Anyone here know? Because they're huge. I think it's something to do with the amount of material used. Because there are plus twos as well, aren't there?

And then plus fours, I think it's an excess of, it's how they are shaped and cut. Billowing material. Yeah. Sweatshirt. The first sweatshirt, 19 goodness yeah um and t-shirt 1920 so that's yeah but i think in some ways 1920s was also the time when people really kind of embraced the idea of maternity modernity as opposed to kind of you know victorian

pre-modern victorian ways so you will find things like the fridge the first fridge in 1926 which was originally spelled frig f-r-i-g which clearly is not great so that was the first abbreviation for a fridge and you know why there's a d in fridge tell us because of the incredibly popular us brand frigidaire and that is why people put the d in so a fridge is an abbreviation of refrigerator so that's the origin of it a refrigerator and that comes way before the 1920s yes but fridges electric fridges were pioneer in the 1920s that was when frigidaire became very very popular Frigidaire gives you fridge. That is the origin of that. The media,

1923 as well. But possibly the best thing of all. If I had to ask you what invention you, well actually you could do without it. It's just a faff. The zip. The zip came about in the 1920s. Yeah. And do you know why it's called The Zip? No. It's because it goes Zip. Genuinely. Is that genuinely how that is named? Yes. It's Zip?

Yes. Yeah. I was lucky enough to know Dame Barbara Cartland. Do you remember Barbara? Do you know what I mean by Barbara Cartland? Where are we going with zips on this one? Barbara Cartland was a romantic novelist and she was very pink she she loved the color pink she always wore pink I remember going to interview her at her house in Hatfield in Hertfordshire and it was a radio interview and she sat in her chair like this and just as the interview was about to begin she leant to

the floor and pressed a button and she was suffused in pink light she suddenly looked like a like a christmas tree and i said oh i'm so sorry dan barbara this is merely a radio interview she said it's a performance all the same and she gave a marvelous performance but she told me that she introduced when the zip was introduced in the 1920s she was a 1920s figure she thought the zips were hugely pan oedd y zip yn cael ei gyflwyno yn y 1920au, roedd hi'n ffigwr 1920au. Roedd hi'n meddwl bod y zipiau yn ddefnyddiol iawn a hoffai cael nhw mewn clwyddi. Roedd hi'n ffrind o Lord Mountbatten o Burma. Ydych chi'n cofio'r ddyn? Louis Mountbatten. Ydw i'n cofio. Dyma'r ffrindrwyr ffavorit Prins Charles.

Wel, y mab o'r Prins Charles. Y mab o'r Ddewc o Edinburgh. Lord Mountbatten of Burma. And he pioneered the use of zip fasteners for flies, for fly buttons. In trousers, until he made them popular and fashionable, it was always buttons. I don't know, why are they called flies? I think they're called flies because otherwise everything flies open. I think that's right. Is that for real?

Yes. Flies on trousers are called flies because things might otherwise fly out unless you did them up. They used to be buttons, but from the 1930s onwards, the zip fastener was used increasingly in trousers, made fashionable first by Lord Mountbatten,

who then persuaded the Prince of Wales, later to be Edward VIII, tofyd i gael zipiau yn ogystal â llwythynau. Ac roedd hynny'n ffasenol i ddyn a gael zipfasner yn ogystal â llwythynau. Mae hynny'n ddiddorol i chi. Mae'n ddiddorol iawn. Nid yn gysylltiedig â'r cod zip yn related to the zip code in America which I think is an acronym for zone implementation protocol or something like that yeah not not related the zip the zip code the zip code and also lots and lots of words for complete bunkum or bologna so applesauce is one of my favorites I think applesauce is used by peachy woodhouse oh a lot of a lot of applesauce what is by P.G. Woodhouse. Oh, a lot of applesauce. What is the origin of that? I think it's genuinely just used because food is often used as a kind of metaphor for a mishmash of stuff.

So flummery used to be a type of pudding. Balderdash was a really unappetizing concoction of alcohol, milk. I think they literally used to put a dead cockerel in there as well. I know it was horrible. That was balderdash. So a lot of similar ideas for a whole mishmash, as I say, of food. Apple sauce, bologna.

That's a kind of food too, isn't it? Bologna is a sausage. So it comes from bologna sausage, yeah. Oh, it comes from bologna, the place. Yes. So it's a load of bologna. It means a load of bologna sausage. yeah. Oh, it comes from Bologna, the place? Yes. So it's a load of bologna. It means a load of Bologna sausage. Yes.

Very good. Buncombe? So Buncombe comes from, it's actually earlier, I think, and it comes from a debate in the US Congress when a politician who was representing, it was a really important debate about whether or not to admit states, slavery-supporting states into the Union. So very, very serious.

And I can't remember his name, but he represented Buncombe County. And he stood up and essentially he just wanted to keep the debate running and just keep talking so that, you know, he would delay a vote basically because he was pro-slavery. And he talked and he talked and he talked and all his colleagues begged him to desist and to sit down and he said no I shall not I am speaking for Buncombe County and so Buncombe became a byword for absolute nonsense Buncombe County yes what is that word when you speak in

a debate you're filibuster filibuster so you could be speaking Buncombe when you're filibustering. What is the origin of filibuster? Filibuster, I'm going to look up, but I think it might come from French. Do you know, I think I might have the OED on here. Good. So you keep talking, no pressure. Well, I'll tell you this. I wrote a biography of the Duke of Edinburgh,

because I happened to know him through a charity in which I was involved. It was his favourite charity, the National Playing Fools Association. And he had in his library a book about the Mountbatten family, which had been called Manifest Destiny, a history of the Mountbattens. And because of the way people write about the royal family, I opened this book and saw that the Duke of Edinburgh had corrected the title which was manifest destiny story of the Mountbatten family he'd corrected the title he crossed out the word destiny and put bunkum so it read manifest bunkum yeah yeah that's what he thought about people who write

books about the royal family. I found it. So yes, from the French, Philippe Bustier, but it was actually originally from Spanish before then. First applied to pirates who pillaged the Spanish colonies in the West Indies.

And so I guess the idea was of sabotaging proceedings, so piracy of proceedings in a way because you're taking hold of it. What about hokum? Hokum. Is that a 20s word? Yeah, hokum began as, it's a riff on hocus pocus,

which was a sham Latin, part of a sham Latin formula used by magicians. I'm trying to get back to 20s. Oh, to make it sound magical. To make it sound magical. It doesn't mean anything. Hocus pocus. Exactly. I'm from the sooty generation.

Izzy, whizzy, let's get busy. But hocus pocus gives you hokum. Gives us hokum. Exactly. So lots and lots of ones for complete rubbish. Also, I mentioned alcohol. So the temperance movement obviously was coming into its prime here. So people were literally on the wagon, which was meant on the water wagon um so they would go around proclaiming that they had they were abstaining from alcohol this is because the good little history here this is because in 1920 in america in fact before then in the teens of the century prohibition was being introduced actually ratified in 1920 and it grows and grows

yes so prohibition in every state and that's when they have speakeasies. Speakeasies. Called a speakeasy. Speakeasies because you could speak freely essentially and drink at the same time. You could behave as you want to do in the speakeasy. Exactly and we also have bootlegged alcohol. Bootlegged is the idea is that smugglers were literally hiding alcohol down their boots. I know it's very strange but that was the idea of bootlegging. roedd y troglwyr yn gwneud yn llyfr, yn gwneud yn llyfr. Mae'n anodd iawn, ond dyna'r syniad o leithio. Yn ôl i'r alcohol, mae gennym hwt. Ydych chi wedi ceisio hwt? Hwt! Nid wyf yn drin alcohol.

Rwy'n llawer yn ystod yr air rwy'n ffyrdd yn Chichester. Ond nid. Hwt, beth yw'r ddodd o hwt? Mae hwt yn gweithio'n hyfryd. Mae'n ysgrifennu Hwtchynw, a oedd y enw o'r Pobl Alasgain. Pan ddodd yna dynion nond-indigynol, roedden nhw'n dod i fynd i fynd i fynd i fynd i fynd i fynd i fynd i fynd i fynd i fynd i fynd i fynd i fynd i fynd i fynd i fynd i fynd i fynd i fynd i fynd i fynd i fynd i fynd i fynd i fynd i fynd i fynd i fynd i fynd i fynd i fynd i fynd i fynd i fynd i fynd i fynd i fynd i fynd i fynd i fynd i fynd i fynd i fynd i fynd i fynd i fynd i fynd i fynd i fynd i fynd i fynd i fynd i fynd i fynd i fynd i fynd i fynd i fynd i fynd i fynd i fynd i fynd i fynd i fynd i fynd i fynd i fynd i fynd i fynd i fynd i fynd i fynd i fynd i fynd i fynd i fynd i fynd i fynd i fynd i fynd i fynd i fynd i fynd i fynd i fynd i fynd i fynd i fynd i fynd i fynd i fynd i fynd i fynd i fynd i fynd i fynd i fynd i fynd i fynd i fynd i fynd i fynd i fynd i fynd i fynd i fynd i fynd i fynd i fynd i fynd i fynd i fynd i fynd i fynd i fynd i fynd i fynd i fynd i fy And so they thought there was absolutely no point in staying here or doing any work with the people at all because they're just always falling over. And it turns out they were drinking their own illicitly made local alcohol,

which was incredibly potent. And so Hootchinoo was... Hootchinoo. Hootchinoo. Hootchinoo. I think it was Hootsnoo or something in the Alaskan Indian people. So it's a name from an indigenous language. Yeah. Very good.

Yeah. Any more alcohol? No, just those amazing cocktails that, as I say, first began to really take over. Yeah, the screwdriver. The screwdriver, that's a orange juice and vodka, I think. Martini, well, that's the name of a brand, isn't it? Martini. Don't get me, I'm not very good with cocktails no i don't i noticed that evening what about is a fall guy i feel a fall guy as a 1920s yes so flicks i think flicks was first recorded for the cinema in at the 1920s because the flickering pictures flickering pictures yeah and silver screen the silver screen was so called because it had a metallic the film had a metallic Roedd Silver Screen yn cael ei enw oherwydd roedd y ffilm yn cael coating sylfaenol metalig i wella'r gwaith. Felly, felly, Silver Screen. Felly, ie, ffordd o ddyn llawr neu ffordd o dyn llawr, yn y bôn. Felly, rhywun a fyddai'n mynd i'r llawr i chi, yw'r syniad, i dyn llawr. A ydych chi'n cofio ffordd o dyn llawr?

Rwy'n gwybod y gair ffordd o dyn llawr, ond dydw i ddim yn gwybod ei olygiad. Iawn, felly, ffordd o dyn llawr. Mae hynny'n mynd yn ôl i'r Beibl ac roedd yn ysgafn ysgafn ac yn y bôn, roedd y cwstwm yn mynd i ddodd dau ysgafn ac ar un o'r ysgafn, byddai'r peidiau o'r bobl yn cael eu llwyddo'n ffigurol ac yn cael eu hannu ac byddai'r arall yn cael ei anfon a'i bannu ieth hi ddod i ffwrdd, felly roedd yn ysgafn. Mae storïau yn y Testament Cenedlaethol sy'n dweud am yr ymdrin yma. Felly dyna beth yw ysgafn. Ac mae'n ymdrin ysgafn yn y 1920au.

Ie. Ac hefyd, a wnaeth y gynastrwyn ddweud ym mis 1920, er bod yna ddim yn mynd i didn't go into space until the 60s? So thanks to people predicting it and science fiction, etc., astronaut, which has got the most beautiful origin, the Greek for star sailor, sailor of the stars. Astronaut, of course. Nought as in nautical, astra as in the stars.

So a sailor through the stars is an astronaut. Is an astronaut. Conceived in the 1920s, when also the robot as the word was introduced. Yes. For that play, Rossum's Universal Robots, R-U-R, by the Capek brothers. The Capek, the Czech, exactly. Yeah, I do remember some of the things you tell me.

No, that's brilliant. Also, I need to tell you about, now, have you heard of this? This was quite new to me, even though I've studied BBC English and I've studied, the bbc have a pronunciation unit which tells all anybody who works within the organization how to pronounce things um so the latest covid variant for example they will have said this is exactly how you omicron omicron i thought it should have been epsilon because that's the letter after delta in the greek alphabet but i read today there are certain letters that avoiding some

because they may apparently have cultural references in other languages that are not comfortable okay and they need to have it a letter that can be easily visualized yeah which is why they've jumped to Omicron and left out other letters because Omicron I think is the Greek for oh yeah it means little oh yeah good yeah anyway so the BBC has this pronunciation unit but I only recently discovered that there was in the 1920s there was something called the BBC Advisory Committee on Spoken English and George Bernard Shaw was at its helm so you probably know more about this, Giles, than me, not that you were there. Not quite. I did know a man who knew Bernard Shaw. I just say that in case there are some Bernard

Shaw enthusiasts here. During the interval, I will shake your hand, and then you'll be shaking the hand that shook the hand that wrote St. Joan. Susie can't offer you that. No. I really can't. Anyway, so they were tasked with coming up with a verbal style guide. So much as the pronunciation unit does now. So that was absolutely fine. And they set the standard pronunciation for things like margarine. They also came up with new words themselves. So for example, one of the challenges was how to come up with the equivalent of a wireless listener for people who were watching the television. And lots of suggestions came up like a seer, an opsi-viewer, a telly-viewer,

and lots and lots of suggestions. Anyway, they chose telly-viewer, T-E-L-E, viewer, but the telly eventually dropped off and they simply called them viewer but that that was their their invention intriguing because when the radio the wireless arrived people automatically said you are a listener you are listening to the wireless therefore you are a listener but when the television came along they weren't sure what to call us so it could have been telecina or yeah could have been telesea telesea yeah but it ended up as televiewer and then it becomes The Viewer.

We The Viewers. I mean, we just don't really think about that. But the other thing that they did is they got rid of the gyratory circus, which became the roundabout. So that was a BBC decision. But this is the thing. Hold on. Roundabouts, because it is so extraordinary, you've got to absorb it.

Roundabouts were to be called gyratory circuses. They were already called gyratory circuses for a very long time. So you go left at the gyratory circus. Yes. No wonder it didn't catch on. And the BBC, somebody at the BBC pronunciation unit said, that won't do, we must come up with something simpler. Yes, but they went a bit rogue.

So this was a surprise for me. They decided that traffic lights should be called stop and goes for example they decided that Christmas festivities should be called Eulery Eulery Eulery and that Christmas itself might be called Eulery and clearly people at the BBC the bosses got a little bit worried because they thought actually you're just going to embarrass us with this you've got to stop so it was abandoned it was it was just split up the Mae'n rhaid i chi ddim. Felly, fe wnaethon nhw ddewis. Roedd y cymitee wedi'i rhannu oherwydd roedden nhw'n dod yn fwy hynod o ddigon o bwysig ac yn fwy hapus. Mae'r Ffrens yn cael cyngor, ond nid yw'r Gymdeithas? Ymgynghorwyd, ie.

Ymgynghorwyd, mae'n penderfynu pa geiriau sy'n gwerthfawr. Ac roedd hyn yn creu fersiwn Saesneg o'r cymitee. Ac fe wnaethon nhw rywun like Bernard Shaw who had lots of opinions and was probably the most famous writer of English though an Irishman. Lady Cynthia Asquith. Lady Cynthia Asquith.

Yeah. Yeah. They all sat on this committee having these grand ideas and then were abandoned. I'm not surprised. Eulery. That would not catch on.

No. That's wonderful. It's strange, isn't it? But yes, but at this time this just shows that I suppose motorcars, et cetera,

were becoming increasingly popular, which is why they needed to think about things like traffic lights and gyratory circuses, et cetera. But yeah, they gave us the roundabout. What was the last thing that filled you with wonder that took you away from your desk

or your car in traffic? Well, for us, and I'm going to guess for some of you, that thing is... Animal Bay! Hi, I'm Nick us, and I'm going to guess for some of you, that thing is... Anime! Hi, I'm Nick Friedman. I'm Lee Alec Murray. And I'm Leah President. And welcome to Crunchyroll Presents The Anime Effect. It's a weekly news show with the best celebrity guests and hot takes galore. So join us every Friday wherever you get your podcasts and watch full video episodes on Crunchyroll or on the Crunchyroll YouTube channel.

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Do you know what you are, Susie Dent, as far as the industry is concerned? You're the real McCoy. Aww. And I say that because I have a feeling that that could be is it a is it a 1880s expression or is it later no that is this decade the real McCoy yeah is only 100 years old yeah and was there a real McCoy well this is another one where there's lots and lots of people contesting for the right to be the real McCoy so there was a boxer called Kid McCoy who um had he was so successful that there were lots of ac yn ymwneud â'r cyfrif i fod yn y Maccoy wirioneddol. Felly roedd yna bwyser o'i enw Kid Maccoy, a oedd yn mor llwyddiannus,

ac roedd yna lawer o fymhau o'i hun i fyny a ddod i lawr i'r llyfr, ac felly roedd yn ei enw Maccoy wirioneddol. Ond roedd yna hefyd distillwyr whisky, a chyfarwyr whisky yng Nghymru, a oedd yn enw Maccoy. Ac roedd ganddyn nhw slogen adroddiadol,

a oedd yn ymwneud â drapa y Maccoy wirioneddol. Ond y Maccoy wirioneddol oedd yr adroddiad. slogan which was a drop of the real Mackay that's terrible but the real Mackay was what was on the ad and we think that everything was kind of conflated in people's minds and the real Mackay became the real McCoy that's exists isn't it white and Mackay it's slow whiskey okay so the real McCoy was really the what real Mackay the real Mackay meaning the original whiskey the one and only the real Mackay exactly okay real Mackay. Meaning the original whisky. The one and only. The real Mackay. Exactly.

Okay. There's one more before we invite questions and contributions from the crowd, because I think this does come from a hundred years ago. Blowing a raspberry. Blowing a raspberry is actually earlier. But I think this was a suggestion by our producer Lawrence, just because he's tickled by this one. Does anyone know where blowing a raspberry comes from? Cockney rhyming.

Yes. Cockney rhyming. Thank you, sir. You can meet Susie in the interval. No one's going to answer anymore if you threaten that. Yes, blowing a raspberry. Raspberry tart. Fart.

Yeah. Because that's the sound you make. That's blowing a raspberry. Do that again. it's quite exciting. You usually do it on a baby's tummy, don't you? I can't do it. That doesn't really sound like a raspberry tart, but... It does, it sounds a bit.

It's lovely, well done. So that's the origin of blowing a raspberry. And when did it start? I think that is at least 20 years earlier. And in fact, speakeasies we've talked about. Speakeasies were 1880. 1881 is the first instance of a speakeasy. So they were around too,

but obviously during prohibition, really came to the fore. Good. Well, there. That's the sort of... I mean, I think Susie Dent is amazing that she knows things that the rest of us don't know. The challenge for us is to remember.

No, it is. I think we probably will remember about blowing a raspberry. Can I just throw in a couple more? No, please. That I had on my list. Because I thought, you know, it's just always incredible how, well, often how recent things are, but also how old things are. So Celeb, for example, the first mention of Celeb was just before 1920. It was

1919. But also recycling, 1926. Microclimate as well, 1925. So they had been around for a very, very long time. Put that in your pipe, Greta. I mean, honestly.

Do you know what this is, Susie? No. It's a microwave. You can see the level at which we're both playing this. She's at the high end, but somebody's got to be down in the gutter. That's lovely. Any more? It is nice.

No, just, just I mean I mentioned this sort of sci-fi and things so to go with astronaut you have a rocket ship and a space suit as well so people were

incredibly prescient in these days so yeah I just but I also love the fact that this was a time of exuberance

and in fact we have an email from a listener who wants to know about one particular thing and that's the bee's knees oh this is a listener who's written know about one particular thing and that's the bees knees oh this is a listener who's written to us in from the nether when they were born in the netherlands the great joy of something rhymes with purple so called because something does rhyme with purple

oh not me um herpal herpal means to walk with a limp yes we have listeners purple people all over the world and this person was born in the Netherlands but now lives in London. Yeah. Anker van Lenteren. Yeah. Great name. And what is their question?

Okay. As a beekeeper, says Anker, I am really intrigued by expressions with the word bee in them. I've asked many American friends for the origin of spelling bee, for instance, and have never had a satisfactory answer. She's thinking quilting bees and knitting bees and also the bee's niece. She'd love to know after years and years of wondering. Good that's Anka who is now living in Sweden. What is the answer? I love the way you said that Sweden. Sweden. So the answer well first of all the sewing bee that is purely because and I think Anka probably had an inkling of this it's because Felly, y ateb yw, yn gyntaf, y byd ymgymryd yn ystod oherwydd, ac rwy'n credu bod Anca wedi cael ei ddweud, oherwydd y dynion cymdeithasol y byd. Felly, mae'n ymwneud â'r syniad o bobl yn dod at ei gilydd

mewn coloni, os ydych chi'n ei hoffi, neu yn ymuno gyda'i gilydd. Felly, mae'n ymwneud â'r agwedd cymdeithasol. Mae mynd mewn llinell byd oherwydd y tendens i'r anseiliad o'r byd i fynd yn llinell bys oherwydd y tendens i'r dynion yn mynd yn llinell yn llinell o ble byddai'n casglu'r bwyd yn ôl i'w llinell. Ac mae'r gynnydd bys, fel y dywedais, dyma'r amser pan oedd pobl yn amlwg yn greadigol yn y Cymru wrth ddisgrifio beth yw'r acnig o ddaear. Felly, mae'r gynnydd bys, a dim un sy'n gwybod pam ei fod yn gynnydd bys, yn cael ei ddefnyddio yn Saesneg i ddweud rhywbeth o'n bach, acme of excellence so the bee's knees and no one knows why it's the bee's knees it was originally used in english to mean something incredibly small because what could be smaller than a bee's knee but a bit like the dog's bollocks actually i'm sorry to use that word again um it kind of shifted

its meaning so the dog's bollocks do you remember is a printer's mark printer's mark for the colon dash because that's what it looks like um and hold on hold on let's we're not as quick as you visualize it everybody uh the dog's bollocks a colon and a dash oh a colon and a dash yes i see what you mean yes depends how you look at it of course whether your dog is lying on its side or standing upright yeah exactly very good okay um but because of this formula it then shifted its meaning to mean something that was absolutely excellent and the same with the bee's knees and there were so many others that sadly haven't made it well the cat's whiskers have and actually there's one suggestion that the whiskers are the um aerials the sort of small um aerials that you

will find on early transmitters that were called the cat's whiskers. But you also had the kipper's knickers, the elephant's adenoids, and a whole raft of similar formulations. But the bee's knees, as I say, began much earlier than the 20s to mean something very, very tiny, but in the 20s meant the best of all.

Does anybody have a question that they would like to put to Susie, or indeed to me, about words from the 20s meant the best of all. Does anybody have a question that they would like to put to Susie or indeed to me about words from the 1920s or indeed words from this part of the world? We're here in Sussex. Feel free to call out at this stage. Oh, yes, hello? Grokkel.

Who? Grokkel? Grokkel. Are you clearing your throat or is this a question? I think the lady is simply saying grockle. Yes, for a tourist. I thought you called them Emmets here, no? You called them grockles, okay. The idea of a grockle, I think, began in a comic book.

Again, if you look it up, it will say Origin Unknown, but I think it was the name of characters in a comic. And I think they must have been quite annoying, because I know grockle is... It's kind of semi-affectionate, isn't it? y enw o gymeriadau yn y comic. Ac rwy'n credu bod yna'n eithaf anodd, oherwydd rwy'n gwybod bod groccol yn... Mae'n rhywbeth o'n hyfforddiant, ydy'n ydy? Mae fy mab yn byw yng Nghymru ac mae'n mynd i ddweud, mae'r groccol yn dod yma eto.

Felly, yn Cornwall, rwy'n credu yw'r Emmet. Ond ie, dyna'r gwestiwn gorau sydd gennym, yw ei fod yn dod o'r comic. Ond roeddwn i'n mynd i ofyn, beth ydych chi'n ei alw'n bwbl-bees yma, neu hyd yn oed bys-de-bwbl, oherwydd rwy'n meddwl, a ydych chi'n cael bys-e-barniishy Barney Bee here? No. An emphatic no. No. Wood lice, do you have a nice thing for wood lice?

Cheesy logs. It's so fascinating how different dialects collect around certain things and for some reason wood lice attract a whole lexicon. Wood lice? Yes. Cheesy logs, chuggy pigs. I mean, all sorts of fascinating words. Grammar sows. Pigs come into it very, very often. But did you say cheesy logs? Cheesy logs.

Granny Grugia. Yes, Granny Grugia. I've heard that as well. What was that one? Repeat it for us. Granny Grugia. Granny Grugia. Yeah.

There's some very, very amazing words, terms for woodlice. Have you got three special words for us? I do. Because what we do on the podcast every week, those of you who are new to it, is that in order to... It pays to increase your word power. Language is power.

The greater your vocabulary, the better life you have. That's our view. And every week, Susie introduces us to three interesting words. And you've got three to give us. And what's's the idea what's the game you want to play with us people have already submitted their own definition of the trio of words that I had posted the first one was petit toes or petty toes petit toes yes how do you spell that so that is petit as in French for small and then toes to you yes Peti, fel y mae'n Ffrenc, am fach, ac yna tos. Peti tos. Ac rydyn ni wedi cael... ..dod o...

..dod o... ..dod o... ..dod o... ..dod o... ..dod o... ..dod o... ..dod o... ..dod o...

..dod o... ..dod o... ..dod o... ..dod o... ..dod o... ..dod o... ..dod o.....dod o.....dod o.....dod o... okay we're not coming here again okay go on this i'm apologize for the next one as well this is for carolyn sims evans from

angmering angmering is lovely miniature silk frilly undergarments you put in each individual toe before a sock or tights. Petit toes. Oh, I rather like that to make it more comfortable. Little sort of undergarments then you pull your socks or tights on afterwards. Yeah. Petit toes. Petit toes. I like that. This one I think, this is I think my favourite. This is from Paul Goddard from Cobra this word describes the first thing that a midwife sees during a breech birth that's char love that given the state of midwifery in this country they're having to import French midwives now it's. I'll tell you what they are really. This is for real.

Pigs trotters served as a delicacy. I know. Pigs trotters served as a delicacy. I'm a celebrity all over again. So I'm definitely with Paul's version there. The next word was a skimmington. A skimmington. A skimmington. Okay.

Stephen Clarke from Fairham. A small, close-minded, miserly, fat-free town. That's brilliant. I like that. This is also great. Craig, is it Gershater? Yes. From Chichester itself.

A Skimmington is the prime minister's approach to detailed analysis or delicate diplomacy okay and this is from Paul Comerford from Nutbourne the ancient Celtic sport of underarm skimming, a frozen cow pats over dew ponds in the winter solstice, gave rise to its centre being based in a new town of Skimmington. Pursuers of this sport were hence

known as Skimmingtons. Oh, brilliant. These are brilliant. What a clever audience. They are. What do you reckon? I think it's got to be the PM, no? Well well what's the truth oh that's true it's not the truth this is a really strange one it was actually a procession that was used to make an example of a nagging wife so explain well that's as much as i know a process procession? It's a really obscure word, yes. A procession that was

used to humiliate a wife. Oh, so like putting in a scolding truels. A scold, exactly. You would take her out on a skimmington. On a skimmington. Not very nice. But I love, just to tell you again, the Prime Minister's approach to detailed analysis or delicate diplomacy is brilliant. see it's brilliant and finally a gas canard a gas canard yes okay right gas canard this is from cordial cordial axle mooring from emsworth to go and panic by fuel very good this is from craig again uh craig gersheter from Chichester. The aftermath of consuming excessive Brussels sprouts for Christmas dinner. And this is from Jess Golf from Waterlooville. What amazing town names.

When Gaston leans into his staggering hubris and attempts to serenade Belle with a song on how great he is. That is a Gasconade. Oh. Which is brilliant. Gosh, I don't know, which one should we go for? Well, we're going to go for the one that's real. song on how great he is that is a gasconade which is brilliant gosh I'm where which one should we go for well we're going to go for the one that's real it's simply also because he's got a great name it's it just would make the

most amazing anagram cordulax of I pronounce that properly yeah cordulax all-murring from ends with to go and panic by fuel I think that's a gas canard yeah very good yeah well done um the real the truth um is and again you might want to make this have a topical reference if you wanted to extravagant boasting and strutting about oh I like that that's a gas canard a gas canard well it sounds like a gas canard Extravagant boasting and strutting. Was that all three? We've done three? That is three. Well done.

So it's time for my poem. It's by Lee Hunt, who lived quite a while ago, 1784 to 1859. And I bet you know this poem, but it's an enchanting poem. And if you want to learn a poem by heart, this is a good one to start with because it's quite short. Jenny, Jenny. And there's several people I signed books for earlier. I put Jenny because that was their name. And for some of the books, people asked me when I signed it not to put my own name, but to put J.K. Rowling

because it might be worth more on eBay. We're not proud. That's the point I'm making. But this is a lovely poem. Jenny kissed me when we met, jumping from the chair she sat in. Time, you thief who loved to get sweets into your list, put that in. Say I'm weary, say I'm sad, say that health and wealth have missed me. Say I'm growing old, but add Jenny kissed me.