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Stanley
Local Historian & Old Fart
36804 Posts
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Posted -
14/11/2010
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06:41
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New version to make loading easier'
Old topic is HERE
Stanley Challenger Graham
Barlick View stanley at barnoldswick.freeserve.co.uk
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Stanley
Local Historian & Old Fart
36804 Posts
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Posted - 30/12/2010 : 05:27
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chamber_pot
Webster says that origin of 'jerry' is probably a 19th century euphemism from Jeroboam, the large 3 litre size wine bottle.
One possibilty for the original use of 'rule of thumb' is that the distance from the tip of the thumb to the first knuckle is remarkably consistent in differnt people and was used as a measurement in ancient times.
Stanley Challenger Graham
Barlick View stanley at barnoldswick.freeserve.co.uk |
Stanley
Local Historian & Old Fart
36804 Posts
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Posted - 30/12/2010 : 05:42
Tiz. Just heard a news item which chimes in with your post. A German administrator has issued an edict to his staff to stop using english phrases like 'lap-top' and use the German equivalent which is usually much longer. I predict he will fail!
Stanley Challenger Graham
Barlick View stanley at barnoldswick.freeserve.co.uk |
Cathy
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Posted - 30/12/2010 : 08:50
Where does 'skiving off' come from? He was skiving off.
All thru the fields and meadows gay .... Enjoy Take Care...Cathy |
Tizer
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Posted - 30/12/2010 : 16:04
Cathy, my Collins dictionary has an entry for skive in the sense of skive off but says "origin unknown". It has another entry for skive meaning `to shave or remove the surface of leather' and claims this is 19th century from the Old Norse word skifa which is "related to English dialect shive a slice of bread". So perhaps skiving off is the same as slicing off, as if you slice off a part of your working day?
Now, when we tell someone to `belt up', meaning shut up, be quiet, where do we get that from? Could it be anything to do with the belt drives in the mills?
Moh, still on your millers' phrases there is: `It's all grist to the mill'. If we step back a little in the process there is `Separate the wheat from the chaff' and `Flailing about' (the flails used to beat the grain from the chaff and straw). I wonder if `Open the flood gates' could have been used to mean open the weir that lets the water onto the wheel in a water mill?
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Bodger
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Posted - 30/12/2010 : 17:08
Tizer, the shive is interesting, in an earlier post on this forum i mentioned the word shoave, in relation to my mother giving me a jam shoave, a slice of bread and jam ?
"You can only make as well as you can measure" Joseph Whitworth |
Bodger
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Posted - 30/12/2010 : 17:56
Not sure if this is dialect ?, but the link refers to ,fothers, coal bolls, & Winchester corn measure !! http://www.dmm-pitwork.org.uk/html/stocks_pic.htm
"You can only make as well as you can measure" Joseph Whitworth |
Stanley
Local Historian & Old Fart
36804 Posts
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Posted - 31/12/2010 : 05:37
I once re-covered a desk top with leather and found that the very thin piece of leather I needed to buy was called a skive. Webster gives origin as Old Norse 'skifa' to slice and I suspect 'shiv' for a knife also comes from the same root.
Bodge, you've encountered the immensly complicated world of ancient measures before there were standards. I hit this problem a long time ago but found Professor Ron Zupko's life-time work 'A Dictionary of Weights and Measures for the British Isles', still available if you search for it. You wouldn't believe the number of names and defintions and all the ones you mention are in there. The Winchester reference is from the fact that in the 11th century Winchester was the administrative HQ of the inveaders and one of the things they tried to do was standardise corn measure to make assessment and taxation more easy.
Stanley Challenger Graham
Barlick View stanley at barnoldswick.freeserve.co.uk |
Stanley
Local Historian & Old Fart
36804 Posts
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Posted - 01/01/2011 : 08:39
I found myself using the word 'saded' for satiated yesterday. Local variation or just me?
Stanley Challenger Graham
Barlick View stanley at barnoldswick.freeserve.co.uk |
tripps
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Posted - 01/01/2011 : 08:47
I took it as a typo for 'jaded'
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Stanley
Local Historian & Old Fart
36804 Posts
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Posted - 22/01/2011 : 04:41
Corruption of 'sated' frm satiated?
Came across a reference to 'wheel stones' in the CH minutes. Obvious from the context that they were 18"x8" stones laid in the road in the wheeltracks of horse drawn vehicles to protect the road surface and give a moother ride.
Found Admiral King mentioned as giving a loan to CHSC in 1902. (see above)
Stanley Challenger Graham
Barlick View stanley at barnoldswick.freeserve.co.uk |
Cathy
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Posted - 22/01/2011 : 11:08
Does anyone know where the term 'Old biddy' comes from and what it means?
All thru the fields and meadows gay .... Enjoy Take Care...Cathy |
elise
Regular Member
70 Posts
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Posted - 22/01/2011 : 17:09
A hen
Derivative of Bridget
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Sunray10
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Posted - 22/01/2011 : 17:31
Old Biddy - an old women with nothing to offer. Also a diminutive form of Bridget. Old hen !
R.Spencer. |
belle
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Posted - 22/01/2011 : 18:25
I wonder if it meant wife, as in a "bidie in" someone who abides with you? A 'bidie in' is old fashioned scots for a common law wife.
Edited by - belle on 22/01/2011 6:27:23 PM
Life is what you make it |
Sunray10
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Posted - 22/01/2011 : 19:02
Biddable - willing to obey. Not too sure about Biddy and Biddie in this context.
R.Spencer. |