[Ads-l] 19th C. "screw"

[Laurence Horn]

FWIW, Farmer & Henley (Vol. VI, 1903) has an extensive entry for _screw_ in mostly nominal uses (ranging from ‘miser’ and ‘turnkey’ to ‘old or worthless horse’ and ‘stomach ache’), among which we find (citing Grose):

8. (old.) A prostitute: see TART. Whence, as verb = to copulate. 

LH 





> On Dec 19, 2016, at 2:43 PM, Jonathan Lighter <wuxxmupp2000 at GMAIL.COM> wrote:
> 
> Sexual "screw," v., is attested in the 18th C., but exx. are
> extraordinarily rare till the mid-20th.
> 
> Here's a U.S. ex., from 1870-1873, cited by B. R. Burg from the diary of
> navy petty officer Philip Van Buskirk (_Rebel at Large_ [2009], p.135):
> 
> "[They say he] screwed his girl twelve times."
> 
> Sociological note: Van Buskirk writes (p. 135) that the wardroom
> conversation of mostly upper-crust American naval officers in the
> mid-Victorian era was largely of "Woman - woman - woman - whores - whores -
> whoring. ...And the language of these recitals!...I have not yet the
> hardihood to write verbatim any part of the amatory recitals which make up
> the conversation of our officers and their friends."
> 
> "Drinking and eating" were the remaining non-professional topics
> (automobiles and CDs not yet having been invented).
> 
> Cf. my long-ago post about bad language during the Civil War, as well as
> the recent one about "a sailor without a knife."
> 
> 
> JL
> 
> 
> -- 
> "If the truth is half as bad as I think it is, you can't handle the truth."
> 
> ------------------------------------------------------------
> The American Dialect Society - https://urldefense.proofpoint.com/v2/url?u=http-3A__www.americandialect.org&d=CwIBaQ&c=-dg2m7zWuuDZ0MUcV7Sdqw&r=wFp3X4Mu39hB2bf13gtz0ZpW1TsSxPIWYiZRsMFFaLQ&m=v36KNOqGtWBNXBgQevzl4GL_PbqCqgZLthzjetyIaf0&s=_LZkwEKnOZAXWF5woavPDOGAtE4WAoyXU5YVQpNR6rY&e= 


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