Holy Sh*t: A Brief History of Swearing (51 page)

Protestants and Protestantism,
4
,
19
,
92
,
116
,
129
,
130
–32,
135
,
137
,
138
,
142
,
180
,
253
,
258

proverbs,
11
,
51
,
183
–85,
209

pubic hair,
20
–21,
73
–74,
85
,
186
–88

pudicitia. See
modesty

Purgatory,
132
–33

Puritanism,
92
,
133
–34,
137
,
176
,
255

Quakers and Quakerism,
78
–80,
179
–80,
182

racial slurs,
6
,
9
–10,
17
,
177
,
223
–26,
231
–33,
236
,
238
–39,
252
,
254
–55

radio,
228
,
230
,
244
–47

“The Ram in a Thicket,”
76

Ranters,
170
–72,
176

rap music,
231
,
247
–48

Read, Allen Walker,
13
,
229
,
231
,
251

recusants,
133

Richard I,
91

Rochester, John Wilmot, Earl of,
173
–76,
178

Rothschild, Lionel de,
179
–81

Ruskin, John,
186
–89,
190
,
191

Salomons, David,
180

sard
,
14
,
88
–89,
97
,
112
,
145
–46,
151
,
154

satire,
46
,
49
,
50
,
51
,
169
,
291
n

Scipio Aemilianus,
36

scolding.
See
insults in court records

Scottish and Scots,
86
,
152
,
155
,
201
,
224
,
247
,
248

Second World War.
See
World War II

self-control,
100
–101

obscenities as dangerous to,
53
,
242
–43

Renaissance ideal of,
53
,
147
–50

Roman ideal of,
21
,
30

Seneca, the Elder,
50

“Seven Sages” of Ostia,
31
–32

sexual schema, Roman,
21
–22,
27
–39

ability to change sex in,
29

medical understanding of,
28
–29

See also
masculinity, priapic;
tribades

Shakespeare, William,
104
,
116
,
166
–67,
191
n,
224
,
291
n

shame,
21
,
37
,
42
,
49
,
50
,
83
,
85
,
221
,
256

development of,
103
,
106
,
109
,
131
,
156
–62,
165
,
205
,
230
,
253
,
289
n

Shaw, George Bernard Shaw (
Pygmalion
),
211
,
215

shit
,
82
,
93
–95,
107
,
153
,
198
,
203
,
214
,
217
,
229
,
245
,
252
,
258

sins of the tongue,
85
–86,
109
–10

See also
foul words

slang,
26
,
33
,
51
,
144
,
153
,
167
,
175
n,
178
,
195
,
200
,
219
–22,
225
,
228
–29,
247
,
256

as vulgar,
177
,
207
–8,
223
–24

slavery,
21
,
30
,
34
–35,
44
,
56
,
216
–17,
265
n

social class
11
,
91
,
126
–27,
157
,
206
,
185

lower,
47
,
157
,
207
–9,
242
,
254

middle,
157
,
176
,
193
,
202
,
206
–12,
222
,
231
,
245

upper,
126
,
162
–65,
202
,
208
–9,
210

See also
vulgar language

sodomy.
See bugger
and buggery;
pedicatio

Southwell, Robert,
129
–38

Speght, Thomas,
165
–66

Stanbridge, John,
95
–96,
111
,
149

stone, paradox of the,
58

stuprum
,
34
–35

Suetonius,
34

Supreme Court, United States,
7
,
234
–35,
237
–38,
245
–46

swearing and swearwords

as Anglo-Saxon,
19

as “bad language,”
13
,
15
,
96
,
108
,
112

brain processing of,
1
,
5
,
250
–52

classes of,
214
–15

and deeper connection to things represented,
6
,
9

elimination of,
254
–55

epidemics of,
15
,
127
,
211

feminization of,
214

future of,
255
–58

gender and,
142
–43,
214

grammatical flexibility of,
214
–15

linguistic studies of,
251
–52

meaning of,
12
,
90
,
112
,
218
–19

nonliteral use of,
6
,
61
,
214
–15

physiological effects of,
5
,
8
,
252

as plain speaking,
26

See also
oaths; obscenities; racial slurs

swive
,
97
–98,
144
,
151
,
153

Synge, John Millington (
The Playboy of the Western World
),
199

taboos

Freud’s definition,
41
–42

new,
255
–58

racial,
225
–26,
231
–32,
255

religious,
3
,
42
,
90
–91,
253

sexual/excremental,
3
,
18
,
22
,
24
,
92
,
106
,
177
,
183
,
199
,
206
,
248
–49,
253
,
256
,
282
n

Tacitus,
185

tarse
,
98
–99

television,
5
,
15
,
44
,
228
,
230
–31,
244
–46

Toiletgate,
202
–3

toilets,
144
,
199
–205

Topcliffe, Richard,
133

Tourette’s Syndrome,
8
,
248
–51

trial by ordeal,
115

tribades
,
27
–29,
98

twat
,
189
–90

urination,
23
–24,
81
–82,
103
,
201
–2,
205

See also piss

use-mention distinction,
12
–13

Venus de Milo,
188
,
190

verpa
,
17
,
39
–45,
46
,
94

Vietnam War,
230
,
237

Virgil,
32
–34,
51
,
165

vows and vowing,
68
–69,
77

vulgar language,
11
,
22
,
52
–53,
82
,
86
,
95
,
149
,
176
–77,
184
–86,
199
,
202
–3,
205
,
207
–9,
225

vulgaria
,
94
–96,
111
,
150

Webster, Noah,
195
,
223

wedding ceremony, Roman,
42
–43

Welsh,
166
–167,
224
,
238

William the Conqueror,
113
–14

World War I,
205
,
227
–29

World War II,
227
,
229
–30,
235

Wyclif, John,
89
–90,
283
n

xenophobia,
223
–25

Yahweh

and Asherah,
71
–73

as God’s “real name,”
64

as one God among many,
64
–66,
271
n

victorious over other gods,
69
–77

yard
,
89
,
95
,
96
,
98
–99

YouTube,
246

zounds
,
168
–69,
178

*
The “Big Six” are always in flux as language and culture change. It is time to include
nigger
, our worst racial insult.

*
A wicket is a small door or gate built into a larger one—a structural analog to the labia and vagina.

*
The symbol
*
before a word indicates that the word has been reconstructed by linguists, applying theories of language change backward to re-create an ancestral language.

*
An andiron is one of a pair of metal supports used to hold up logs in a fireplace. This is not a bizarre mistranslation, but an attempt to avoid obscenity through metaphor. In Latin, the female genitalia were often depicted through baking metaphors: the vagina as the oven, the labia as the hearth.

^†
Lucretia was a Roman paragon of chastity. When she was raped by Tarquinus, she committed suicide rather than bear the shame.

*
Cinaedus
was used for a fish that wriggles its tail—suggestively, the Romans thought. Ganymede is Zeus’s/Jupiter’s cupbearer, the archetype for a boy lover.

*
It is bad to be called a cocksucker (our equivalent to
fellator
) in English too, but this is mostly because of our culture’s negative views of homosexuality. A Roman woman could be attacked as a
fellatrix
, but it doesn’t make sense in English to insult a woman as a cocksucker. As Lenny Bruce reportedly said, “You call a guy a cocksucker, that’s an insult. You call a lady a cocksucker—hey, that’s a nice lady.” On the flip side, women can take heart that though
clit
is not a swearword, neither is
cunt licker
.

*
An aedile was an official responsible for public festivals and for the care of the city—making sure temples, sewers, and so forth were in good repair.

*
The great exception is the first volume of Horace’s
Sermones
, where the language is as salty as that of any epigram. (
Salty
came to mean “racy, piquant, earthy” from two different directions. It describes the language of sailors, “old salts,” whose vocabulary is sprinkled with obscene and vulgar words. In the seventeenth century, however,
salt
was used, as the
Oxford English Dictionary
puts it, “of bitches: In heat.” It came to be applied to people as well, meaning “lecherous, salacious.”)

*
From 1600 to 1200 BC, the Hittites ruled a wide-ranging empire in what is now Turkey, Syria, and possibly Israel. They left fairly extensive written records, including a collection of laws quite similar to those laid down in the early books of the Bible. These differ in some of the details, however. Exodus forbids bestiality on pain of death (Ex. 22:19), for example, while the Hittites had a more complicated view: “
If anyone have intercourse
with a pig or a dog, he shall die. If a man have intercourse with a horse or a mule, there is no punishment. But he shall not approach the king, and shall not become a priest. If an ox spring upon a man for intercourse, the ox shall die but the man shall not die. One sheep shall be fetched as a substitute for the man, and they shall kill it. If a pig spring upon a man for intercourse, there is no punishment. If any man have intercourse with a foreign woman and pick up this one, now that one, there is no punishment.” The more things change …

*
Different religious groups have different ways of numbering the Decalogue. To Jews and Protestants, this is the third commandment; to Catholics, it is the second.