8 Lovely Swear Words and Insults We Should Never Have Stopped Using

The rantallions and jobbernowls who let these genuinely delightful words fall out of favor have a lot to answer for!

Jack Shepherd
Cellar Door

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Sometimes you need to express yourself colorfully without getting yourself kicked out of the Condo Board Meeting, so it’s always a good idea to brush up on these lovely forgotten swear words and insults that will be immediately handy in your day-to-day life without (probably) getting you in trouble with the scumberheaded smatchet who lives in #2. Here are a few absolutely delightful ones that you can start using right away!

“Scumber” is the droppings of a dog or a fox. It also has a verbal form that can be extended to humans in a jocular fashion, as in this classic witticism from “Choyce Drollery: Songs and Sonnets,” printed in 1656:

Beware of fire when you scumber,

Though to sh… fire were a wonder,

Yet lightning oft succeeds the thunder,

Which nobody can deny.

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Jack Shepherd
Cellar Door

I have a newsletter about crossword puzzles and a podcast about rom-coms. Formerly editorial director @BuzzFeed. Email: JackAShepherd at gmail