Did they say that..?

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ccarver30

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Where I can I find out if certain words were used in a specific time and place? I want to call someone a "bitch" but I am not sure the word would mean the same exact thing in 19c. England as it does today.
Help, please and thank you!
 

batgirl

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I have a copy of the complete OED - you can find the 2 vol set with magnifying glass pretty easily on ebay. Or there's a sort of condensed version with some (not all) of the quotes that shows up quite cheaply - I can't think of the exact title, it's 12 thinnish volumes.
I'd guess that in the 19th c. 'bitch' was used by quite respectable people to mean a female dog, and wouldn't have the suggestion of vindictiveness it now has, female dogs being placid creatures overall. Maybe 'harridan'? 'shrew'? 'fishwife'?
-Barbara
 

Cathy C

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OED = Oxford English Dictionary (for those unfamiliar with the abbreviation.) Many writers and editors prefer it over Webster's for the superior details, such as when the word came into usage. :)
 

san_remo_ave

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Here's another link you might try. It's called The Vulgar Tongue and has slang from the British underworld, circa 1811.

http://www.fromoldbooks.org/Grose-VulgarTongue/

bitch (Grose 1811 Dictionary)A she dog, or doggess; the most offensive appellation that can be given to an English woman, even more provoking than that of whore, as may he gathered from the regular Billinsgate or St. Giles’s answer—“I may be a whore, but can’t be a bitch.”

Definition taken from The 1811 Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue, originally by Francis Grose.
 
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