"blowing" = "blowen" (and the OED)

[Robin Hamilton]

Ha!!!  My jaw dropped a little as I read your email, Jon, since I remembered 
you citing Mount, Tufts, and the admirable Reverent Tefft of_Ladies 
Repository_ fame.

Actually, as well as glossing the word, Mount includes it in the text of one 
of the poems he (partially) repeats, a variant of "To the hundreds of 
Drury", and if I remember correctly, Tefft has it in several phrases, 
including "dinge blowen".  So the term probably was fairly widely current, 
in the "blowen" form, in America from the late eighteenth century on, 
deriving from English criminal cant brought across by transportees before 
the War of Independence, as evidenced by Thomas Mount's use of it.

More on blower/blowing/blowen (bloan, blone) in response to Joel, anon.

Robin

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-----Original Message----- 
From: Jonathan Lighter
Sent: Wednesday, October 08, 2014 7:45 PM
To: ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU
Subject: Re: "blowing" = "blowen" (and the OED)

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Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
Poster:       Jonathan Lighter <wuxxmupp2000 at GMAIL.COM>
Subject:      Re: "blowing" = "blowen" (and the OED)
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Ignore the above.

I was unduly influenced by Joel's authoritative comment about "blowen" (and
missed Robin's reply) and didn't check for myself.

The old gray recall ain't what he used to be.

JL


On Wed, Oct 8, 2014 at 2:37 PM, Jonathan Lighter <wuxxmupp2000 at gmail.com>
wrote:

> ---------------------- Information from the mail header
> -----------------------
> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Poster:       Jonathan Lighter <wuxxmupp2000 at GMAIL.COM>
> Subject:      Re: "blowing" = "blowen" (and the OED)
>
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> I have no evidence (independent of Matsell's unreliable _Vocabulum_) that
> either _blowing_ or _blowen_ was ever current in the U.S.
>
> Hence no HDAS entries.
>
> JL
>
> On Wed, Oct 8, 2014 at 10:42 AM, Joel S. Berson <Berson at att.net> wrote:
>
> > ---------------------- Information from the mail header
> > -----------------------
> > Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> > Poster:       "Joel S. Berson" <Berson at ATT.NET>
> > Subject:      Re: "blowing" = "blowen" (and the OED)
> >
> >
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
> >
> > Thanks, Robin.  I did have HDAS if not on my bookshelf at least open
> > upon my desk ... well, upon Widener Library's Reference Room's
> > desk... as I was investigating its spurious 1824 quotation for
> > "fancy-girl".  But it has no entry for "blowing" -- nor any relevant
> > sense under the verb "blow" -- and I would not have thought to look
> > for "blowe...".  Nor did I find "blowing" in the OED, since I was
> > intimidated by its 949 quotations containing that word; even starting
> > at "blow..." only removed 55.
> >
> > The OED2 subsumes "blowing" under "blowen" ("Forms:  Also blowing"),
> > and I assume therefore its entry should include quotations with
> > either spelling.  Its earliest citation is 1818 (for "blowen", from
> > Vaux).  The 130-year antedating in Thomas Shadwell's _The Squire of
> > Alsatia_ should be added (if confirmed; a 1688 edition is in EEBO).
> >
> > Joel
> >
> > At 10/8/2014 02:39 AM, Robin Hamilton wrote:
> > >...
> > >1821 J. Burrowes _Life in St. George's Fields ..._  p. [25].
> > >
> > >"Blowing, a fancy girl".  (This is within what Burrowes presents as
> > >"A Slang Dictionary" to interpret his character's speech.)
> > >
> > >Imprint London: 1821.  GBooks, full view.  [I have not tried to trace
> > >"blowing" as a British "slang" term.]
> > >   ...
> > >Joel
> > >
> >
> >
> >--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
> > >
> > >"Blowing" is the earlier form of the more familiar "blowen",
> > >earliest citation I think 1688 in Thomas Shadwell's _The Squire of
> > >Alsatia_. Although the "blowing" form is found as late as Byron's
> > >_Don Juan_ (1811), it has been more-or-less replaced by "blowen" by
> > >the end of the eighteenth century.  As can be seen by tracing the
> > >shift between the two terms in the course of the evolution of the
> > >five editions of Grose's _Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue_ between
> > >1785 and 1823.
> > >
> > >Not just English but American too.  There's a succinct entry in
> > >HDAS, which everyone has on their bookshelves (or ought to have).
> > >
> > >Robin
> > >------------------------------------------------------------
> > >The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
> >
> > ------------------------------------------------------------
> > The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
> >
>
>
>
> --
> "If the truth is half as bad as I think it is, you can't handle the 
> truth."
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