ETYMOLOGY
from piss (vb.) + bed (n.),
from its diuretic property;
so French pissenlit (dandelion, bed-wetter)
EXAMPLE
“…Rosecampany; Maudlen, and Cost,
And London touft so red:
Agrimony and Lyons tooth,
That Chyldren call Pysbed…”
From: The Courte of Vertu
By John Hall, 1565
ETYMOLOGY
of uncertain origin
From the Oxford English Dictionary:
The form appears to suggest a French origin (compare pigeon n.), but French forms are first attested significantly later than the English word: compare †vigeon kind of West Indian duck (1667), †vingeon kind of duck observed in Madagascar (1690), kind of West Indian duck (1767 or earlier), Eurasian wigeon (Buffon 1783, also as †gingeon), American wigeon (J. Latham 1785), and it is even possible that the French word was borrowed < English.
PRONUNCIATION
WIJ-uhn
EXAMPLE (for n. 2)
“…Such as you shall like too: what say you to this young Gent. He is the widgen that wee must feed vpon…”
From: The Miseries of Inforst Mariage
By George Wilkins, 1607
ETYMOLOGY
from gutter + lane
EXAMPLE
“…All goeth down Gutter-lane (A small Lane in the City otherwise Guthurum lane.) Appliable to great Gluttons and Drunkards…”
From: Anglorum Speculum
By George Sandys, 1684
ETYMOLOGY
from Latin monti-, mons (mountain) + vagantem, pres. pple. of vagari (to roam) + -ant
EXAMPLE
“…Downward he speeds to mingle in the fray
As headlong rolls the torrent of the hills
When wintry storms montivagant outpour
Their pluvious treasures from the deep purloined…”
From: Rogvald: An Epic Poem
By John Fitzgerald Pennie, 1823
ETYMOLOGY
compound of dumble (similar to bumble) + dor (a buzzing flying insect)
EXAMPLE
“…I thank you for your poetry. What is the burnie-bee? Is it not the humble-bee, or what we call the ‘dumbledore‘ – a word whose descriptive droning deserves a place in song?…”
From: A Memoir of the Life and Writing of William Taylor
By John Warden Robberds, Sir Robert Southey, 1799
ETYMOLOGY
from Latin nequient-, nequiens, present participle of nequire (to be unable)
EXAMPLE
I am, and probably always will be, nequient in the musical arts.
ETYMOLOGY
from Latin utibilis, from utor (to use, employ)
EXAMPLE
“…Proposals by the Utible Society, for the Insurance on Marriages, by a weekly Dividend,
at the office, next door to the blue boar, over-against the half moon tavern in Aldersgate street…”
(Book title)
From: Example book title (above), ?1711
ETYMOLOGY
from Latin cruentus (bloody) + -ous
EXAMPLE
“…Thus a cruell and most cruentous civill war began which lasted neer upon foure yeers without intermission, wherin there happen’d more battailes, sieges and skirmishes, then passed in the Netherlands in fourescore yeers, and herein the Englishmen may be said to get som credit abroad in the world, that they have the same blood running in their veines (though not the same braines in their sculls) which their Ancestors had, who were observed to be the activest peeple in the field, impatient of delay, and most desirous of battaile then any Nation…”
From: A Venice Looking-Glasse
By J.B.C., 1648
ETYMOLOGY
from cormorant (a greedy or rapacious person)
EXAMPLE
“…There would be many money-cormorants, and their profit great….”
From: The Scales of Commerce and Trade
By Thomas Willsford, 1660
ETYMOLOGY
shortened by-form of commence
EXAMPLE
“…Her cumſeð þe uie of seinte iuliane. ant telleð of liflade hire…”
From: Þe Liflade of St. Juliana (The Life of St. Juliana)
(Royal Manuscript), a1225
Lexicophilia 