Antedating of "Suck"

[Mark Mandel]

I understood Jon's reply as meaning that

a) this passage says "sucked it", where

b) "it" is anaphoric to the other man's "c - k", and therefore

c) "suck" is being used here in its basic sense, the same as when the object
is a lollipop or a mother's breast or a siphon; and so

d) there's no data here to support an explicitly sexual *sense* of the word
"suck".

Does "suck" have an explicitly gustatory (or whatever) sense in "suck a
lollipop"? Same situation, same argument. Sweets, or sex, are in the context
of these examples, not in the verb.

m a m

On Wed, Jun 30, 2010 at 9:03 AM, Joel S. Berson <Berson at att.net> wrote:

> Jon, are you arguing that the transitive "explicitly sexual sense"
> has to have a whole person as the direct object ("sucked him/her"),
> and disallowing that a part of the person be the direct object
> ("sucked it", as in the quotation provided)?  Seems too fine a
> distinction for my tastes.
>
> Joel
>
> At 6/27/2010 02:19 PM, Jonathan Lighter wrote:
> >A sexual context but not specifically a "sexual sense."
> >
> >An explicitly "sexual sense," to my way of thinking, would have to be
> either
> >intransitive or have a personal direct object. Cf.:
> >
> >ca1866 _The Romance of Lust_ 26 (rpt. N.Y.: Grove Press, 1968) : To try
> >again to fuck her as well as suck her.
> >1975 Joseph Wambaugh _The Choirboys_ 301 (rpt. N.Y.: Dell, 1976) : Look,
> do
> >you suck or not?
> >
> >HDAS files has an intrans. ex. from 1951.
> >
> >
> >JL
> >
> >On Sun, Jun 27, 2010 at 1:11 PM, Shapiro, Fred <fred.shapiro at yale.edu
> >wrote:
> >
> > > ---------------------- Information from the mail header
> > > -----------------------
> > > Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> > > Poster:       "Shapiro, Fred" <fred.shapiro at YALE.EDU>
> > > Subject:      Antedating of "Suck"
> > >
> > >
> >
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
> > >
> > > A website at www.londonlives.org has a very interesting searchable
> corpus
> > > of manuscripts and printed materials relating to "Crime, Poverty,
> > and Social
> > > Policy in the Metropolis" between 1690 and 1800.  Here is a
> > citation for the
> > > verb "suck" in its sexual sense, much before the 1928 first use in the
> > > Oxford English Dictionary (but note 1891 citation in OED s.v.
> > _cocksucker_):
> > >
> > >
> > > 1772 _Old Bailey Proceedings_ 9 Sept. (www.londonlives.org)   John
> Gray <
> > > no role > . Crook was brought to our watch-house, in Swan-yard, on
> Monday
> > > morning, by Dennis; Crook said that on the 3d of September he left off
> work
> > > in the evening, about seven o'clock; went to the Red Lion in
> Moorfields, to
> > > drink a pint of beer; that just as he had drunk the beer, Gibson
> > came in and
> > > sat down by him; that Gibson asked him to drink with him; that when he
> > > called for another pint, he asked him if he knew Dick that had lived
> there;
> > > said he, he had a fine - fit to do Mrs. - ; he said after that, he went
> out
> > > at the door to make water, and Gibson followed him, and said,
> > what sort of a
> > > c - k have you got? Dick was just such another slim young man as
> > you; let me
> > > teel it; which he did; he said it was not so big as his; that then he
> took
> > > him down to the vault, forced him down on the seat, onbuttoned
> > his breeches,
> > > then worked him till he made it come, and then sucked it; that he
> worked it
> > > again s!
> > >  ometime; that then he pressed him very close, called him his dear,
> hugged
> > > him and squeezed him and sat down, put his hand behind him, and put it
> into
> > > his b - e, and worked up and down till he hurt him vastly, and he
> believed
> > > made him bleed.
> > >
> > >
> > > Fred Shapiro
> > > Editor
> > > YALE BOOK OF QUOTATIONS (Yale University Press)
>
>

------------------------------------------------------------
The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org