[Ads-l] Youneverknow: _fisticate_

Wilson Gray hwgray at GMAIL.COM
Sun May 22 08:41:28 UTC 2016


In Saint Louis BE, this is commonly-used slang, an intransitive verb
construed with _with_ and having the meaning, "meddle.".

"Don't fisticate with the papers on my desk. They're important."

"Don't be fisticating with my old lady, partner. That ain't cool *one*
pound."

(As far as I know, the use of _*one* pound_ or  _a *pound*_ to mean "at
all" is/was? peculiar to The Lou.)

It's not in HDAS. So, I Googled it and found:

Americanisms, Old & New - Page 242
https://books.google.com/books?id=OQY1AQAAMAAJ - Page 242 - Read
"Fisticate, To. — To quarrel; _to meddle_; to fight. Compare with "
fisticuff." Fisticate was at one time the subject of considerable
discussion."

Youneverknow.
-- 
-Wilson
-----
All say, "How hard it is that we have to die!"---a strange complaint to
come from the mouths of people who have had to live.
-Mark Twain

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



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