ETYMOLOGY
from modern Latin bibitorius, from bibit- ppl. stem of bibere (to drink)
EXAMPLE
“…The verdict does not favour total abstinence, though it is decidedly against bibitory indulgence. It was clear from the close study of the patient – who was so well-formed and healthy that hey may be regarded corporeally as a typical man – that alcohol was not necessary to him…”
From: The Gentleman’s Magazine and Historical Chronicle
Volume 229, 1870
Notes and Incidents
ETYMOLOGY
an imitative or expressive formation
EXAMPLE
“…Hoe! God, be here! on their bald, burnt, parchment pates. Pish, pish! what talke you of olde age or balde pates? Men and women that haue gone vnder the south pole, must lay of theyr furre night-caps in spyght of their teeth, and become yeomen of the vineger bottle…”
From: Pierce Penilesse, His Supplication to the Diuell
By Thomas Nashe, 1592
ETYMOLOGY
of unknown origin
EXAMPLE
“…Albius. For fault of a better, Sir.
Tucca. A better; prophane Rascall? I cry thee mercy (my good Scroile?) was’t thou?
Albius. No Harme, Captaine…”
From: Poetaster, or the Arraignment
By Ben Jonson, 1602
ETYMOLOGY
adj,: apparently from Italian vago
EXAMPLE
“…no doubt but better parts, finer colours, purer lights proportionably combined, cause a more excellent beautie, shew, and lustre: as the siner gold, the richer stones (if art bee correspondent) the more vage and beautifull iewell…”
From: The Passions of the Minde in Generall
By Thomas Wright, 1604
ETYMOLOGY
for adj.: of obscure origin
for n.1.: from teat () + -y
EXAMPLE
“…but if they loose, though it be but a trifle, two or three games at tables, or a dealing at Cards for 2d a game, they are so cholericke and tetty that no man may speake with them, and breake many times into violent passions, oaths, imprecations, and vnbeseeming speeches, little differing from mad men for the time…”
From: The Anatomy of Melancholy
By Robert Burton, 1621
ETYMOLOGY
from Latin strepitat-, ppl. stem of strepitare (to make a repeated noise),
frequentative of strepere (to make a noise)
EXAMPLE
“…It’s yet, I say, to be mentioned to Uncle Harcourt, who’ll blow a stout gale, I know, enough to wreck some of us, when it is mentioned. He’ll strepitate finely, to use one of his own great words…”
From: Farquhar Frankheart; Or, Incidents in the Introduction of Methodism into Yorkshire
By Farquhar Frankheart, 1860
ETYMOLOGY
from Latin uberant-, uberans, pres. pple. of uberare, from uber (rich, plentiful)
EXAMPLE
“…Where the fountaine is vberant, needs must the streames bee fluent. This double compellation argue the double affection, and that produceth doubled lamentation…”
From: Elisha His Lamentation
By Charles Fitz-Geffry, 1622
ETYMOLOGY
as if from libentious (from Latin libentia, from libentem, libens (willing)) + -ous + -ly
EXAMPLE
“…Most-what by Women, sillie Girles, youths, firie-wits, Ambitious,
By great, by needy Mal-Contents, by Credulous, and Vitious,
Work Romes Committees, & from flesh to fare much more delicious
Penance their Puples: whitest Sons these Seedsters and Seditious.
And, that for them libentiously Fooles-Catholike should erre,
Pensions, Canonizing at least, on Rome-wrights they conferre…”
From: A Continuance of Albions England
By William Warner, 1606
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
Lexicophilia 