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Satanica

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http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-41266000
[....]
Dominic Watt, senior linguistics lecturer at the University of York, said he hoped people would re-engage with the language of old.

The team spent three months searching through old books and dictionaries to create the list.
[....]
"We've identified lost words that are both interesting and thought-provoking, in the hope of helping people re-engage with language of old," he said.

"Snout-fair", for example, means "having a fair countenance; fair-faced, comely, handsome", while "sillytonian" refers to "a silly or gullible person, esp one considered as belonging to a notional sect of such people".

"Dowsabel" is "applied generically to a sweetheart, 'lady-love'".

Margot Leadbetter, the snobby neighbour from 1970s BBC sitcom, The Good Life, could be seen as an arch example of a "percher" - someone "who aspires to a higher rank or status; an ambitious or self-assertive person".

The BBC series Trust Me is the story of a "quacksalver" - a person who "dishonestly claims knowledge of, or skill in, medicine; a pedlar of false cures".
[....]
30 "lost words" are grouped into three areas the researchers feel are relevant to modern life: post-truth (deception); appearance, personality and behaviour; and emotions.

The final list also includes the words "ear-rent" - described as "the figurative cost to a person of listening to trivial or incessant talk", "slug-a-bed" - meaning "a person who lies in late", and "merry-go-sorry" - a phrase used to describe "a mixture of joy and sorrow".
 
I thought slug-a-bed was still in current usage. Guess it was only me.
There are enough "lost" words for another language.
So why talk about just 30 of them?
 
"Quacksalver" still survives in an abbreviated form: quack.

--Al
 
"Quacksalver" still survives in an abbreviated form: quack.

It also survives in Dutch as Kwakzalver (same pronounciation). Interesting as Medieval English and Dutch were apparently very similar.

I think this one should make a come-back asap:
'Rouzy-bouzy - Boisterously drunk'
 
"Nickum" is on the list as a "cheat or dishonest person". But we use this, as.. what? A transitive verb? "The Fed Ex guy nicked my pen." "I nicked this shirt from my lousy ex." "The thieves had nicked his television and DVD player."

I think it's more common in British English, but it's something I heard in New England and the Midwest.

Disappointed the article has no link to the entire list, or if it did, I missed it.
 
Fuck everytime I go to Walmart I begin to suspect the words condom, birth control, and abortion have been lost to all languages.
 
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