[Lexicog] Digest Number 464

[Leela Pienaar]

'creeping jenny' is the name of a well-known groundcover in SA. I also found the foll. in the OED:
 *jumping-betty*, a popular name of the Garden Balsam, /Impatiens Balsamina/, the seeds of which jump out of the elastic capsules when these are touched (Parish /Sussex Gloss./ 1875);
 *jumping-jack*,
a child's toy made out of the merry-thought of a fowl; a toy figure of
a man, which is made to jump by being pulled with strings; also /transf./: see quots.; 
*jumping-Johnny **1865* /Reader/ No. 140. 264/1 The plate-sawing machine called a *Jumping Johnny.

Leela 
-- 
Leela Pienaar
Associate Editor
Dictionary Unit for South African English
Rhodes University
PO Box 94 Grahamstown 6140
Phone/Fax 046 603 8107 
___________________________________________________________________________
Recently I  corresponded with someone on this list about the meaning of a
>German ompound word following the pattern 'verb/noun + a first name as a  suffix,'
> like: 

> Zappelphilipp = a  boy who can't sit still
> Laberheini = rambling person (Heini is short for  Heinrich)
> Heulsuse = someone (man or woman) who cries a lot (Suse is short  for
> Susanne) 
 Examples would be  "smoking Joe" (for
> the boxer Joe Frazier), "studying Jesse," "peeping Tom,"  "doubting Thomas",
>  especially if they have "made it" to become common  expressions and are
> included in the dictionary.
 
> Fritz  Goerling



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