Ten Dirty Words You Don’t Know (Part 1)
A warning: To write about swear words and curse words (you don’t know), I actually have to use the words and the words they allude to, otherwise we’d soon be swimming in, and then drowning in, euphemisms. This three-part blog post is peppered with — surprise! surprise!— offensive words that you do know.
Trying to give due respect to those with a sensitive disposition, I have chosen to use these words only where I consider it necessary to the narrative. Elsewhere I have resorted to terms such as f-word or s-word, making you guess which foul term is indicated.
You have been warned!
About Swearing
The word swear has two meanings, or at least it seems that way. Swearing, as in “swearing an oath,” means making a solemn promise, and swearing also means using foul language. The two meanings are closely related since the swearing of an oath traditionally involved swearing on the Bible or in God’s name. So when, in the 16th century, people developed a habit of invoking “sacred names” when no oath was being made, they were guilty of “taking sacred names in vain.” Such an act was profane (the opposite of sacred) and the word used to describe such a horrendous sin was profanity.
Honestly, I think it was inevitable that this habit arose. The Third Commandment, the taking-names-in-vain one, almost certainly guaranteed that the human race would eventually start swearing like mad. Nothing tempts us sinners to “shalt” more than a stern “shalt not…”
The same applies to cursing, since cursing traditionally involved invoking sacred or demonic entities by name, and enlisting their assistance in causing bad things to rain down upon the person cursed. So inappropriate cursing is also profanity.
Here is the beginning of my list of ten words that you’ve probably not met with before, which relate to swear words and curse words.
Etymon
As a general rule, swearing of any kind is frowned on in polite society and has been through the ages. So there is a tendency to invent euphemisms for swear words in order that they might be used in a milder form. In the Middle Ages, the fashion was to use nonsense or vaguely sound-alike words as substitutes for sacred names. That produced religious swear words like egad and zounds. Egad was a simple substitute for God. Zounds was a shortening of God’s wounds, as was — excuse my French — woundikins. Odds bodkins stood in for God’s body, and gadzooks was God’s hooks, referring to the nails used in crucifixion.
You might think that the creation of such religious swear words has stopped, but it hasn’t. The newer ones simply don’t sound so archaic. Gee whiz and jeez (for Jesus) are quite recent, as are: jeepers creepers (for Jesus Christ), doggone (for God damn), gosh or golly (for God) and great scott (for good God). Also recent is the use of the names Christopher Columbus, Judas Priest and Jiminy Cricket as mild swear words for which the etymon is Jesus Christ. An etymon, by the way, is a root word from which other words derive, and etymology is, of course, the study of etymons.
Execration
To most people, the use of such religious swear words is now regarded as tame and has no real place in execration, execration being the act of cursing, the curse itself, as well as the thing that is cursed or loathed. When you really want to express yourself by cursing, obscure Christian euphemisms no longer cut the mustard. However, direct curses are rarely offensive in the words they employ, since the whole point is to wish ill on someone rather than deliver a spirited insult.
Take for example the Chinese curse: “May you come to the attention of the authorities!” It may sound a little lame at first blush, but that’s probably because a certain amount of bile has been lost in translation. For U.S. tax evaders “May you come to the attention of the IRS!” is about as mean as a curse can get. Even so, it doesn’t have the poetic grit of my favorite Arab curse: “May wild asses defile the grave of your grandmother!”
Neither does it have the surreal spitefulness of my favorite Irish curse: “May the seven terriers of hell sit on the spool of your breast and bark in at your soul-case!”
What the hell does that mean?
10 Dirty Words You Don’t Know (Part 2)
10 Dirty Words You Don’t Know (Part 3)
If you’re interested in other obscure words you don’t know, click here.
Robin Bloor is the author of Words You Don’t Know. For the record, he is also the author of The “Common Sense” of Crypto Currency, runs the website TheDataRightsofMan.com, is a founder of TurtleIslandCoin.io and a member of the advisory board for Permission.io.
