Authors: Jesse Sheidlower
frick
(a partial euphemism for)
FUCK
in various senses and parts of speech, esp. as
fricking
adjective
.
1936
E. Partridge
Dictionary of Slang & Unconventional English
982:
Fricking
. A s. euphemism for
f**king,
adj.: C.20 On or ex
frigging,
adj.
1942
J. Aldridge
Signed with Their Honor
234: I wonder where those frickin’ Jerries are.
1952
M. Cooper
Sironia, Texas
II. 1391: If you ever so much as thinks ’bout tellin’ dat frickin’ Night Chief
anything
, you goner get such a bust in de mouf my fist’ll end up in yo’ stummuck.
1967
W. Crawford
Gresham’s War
125: “And meantime?” “Frick the dog, I reckon.”
1970
New York Magazine
(Mar. 30) 32/2: “Frickin’ kids.… Those frickin’ kids.” Frank never swears.
1970
in P. Heller
In This Corner
237: That fricking bum.
1976
C. Rosen
Mile Above the Rim
40: Jesus H. Keerist! What a fricken ball club!
1977
N. Dowd
Slap Shot
(film): Grab your frickin’ gear and get goin’.
1986
L.A. Law
(NBC-TV): You got a problem with that, you go live in the
frickin
’ Soviet Union!
1987
U.S. college professor, age
ca
65: In Albany [N.Y.,
ca
1934] we used
frick-in
’ a lot. Certainly more than
friggin
’: “That frickin’ son of a bitch!”
1988
J. F. Powers
Wheat that Springeth Green
234: Well, I’ll be fricked.
1989
CBS Summer Playhouse
(CBS-TV): Who do you think you are? Attila the Hun? Jack the fricking Ripper?
1989
21 Jump St.
(Fox-TV): Absofrickin’lutely! We’re talking total obliteration.
1992
N. Baker
Vox
56: I get so fricking horny.
1998
Sick Puppy Comix
(Sydney, Australia) (No. 7) 2: Maybe things will change now that I’ve got this frickin’ hi-tech e-mail address.
2001
New York Magazine
(Apr. 2) 15/4: One hundred thousand [New Yorkers] are waiting for some snotty salesgirl in Bergdorf’s, 100,000 are on hold with NYNEX, or Verizon or AT&T or Lucent or whatever the frick the company is called now,…and the rest are stuck in traffic.
2001
FHM
(Feb.) 120/1: [“]In
American Pie
, you utter the infamous line, “One time at band camp, I stuck a flute in my pussy!”—were you embarrassed at all at saying it?[”] [“]God no! I fricking loved that script as soon as I got it.[”]
2004
N. Flynn
Another Bullshit Night in Suck City
iii. 205: By morning it all will be gone—no inside no outside, no cardboard box no mansion, no
birth no death, no container no contained, a Zen koan, a frikkin riddle.
2009
Scrubs
(ABC-TV) (Feb. 3): “You know what? Frick them!” “Frick them? I’m one of them!” “But they’re acting like a bunch of frick-heads. Sorry about all the f-bombs.”
frig
noun
1
. an instance of masturbation.
1786
R. Burns in J. S. Farmer
Merry Songs
IV 282: Defrauds her wi’ a frig or dry-bob.
ca
1890
My Secret Life
V. viii. 171: I pulled out my prick and with two or three frigs spent in a spasm of pain and pleasure.
ca
1890
My Secret Life
XI. xi.: A frig in a summer house. A frig in a grotto.
2
. an act of copulation.
1888
Stag Party
62: What is the difference between a flag and a frig? One is bunting, the other is cunting.
1927
Immortalia
44: ’Twas a frig to a finish.
3
. a damn;
FUCK
,
noun
, definition 3a.
1954–55
M. McCarthy
Charmed Life
66: This is ridiculous.… I don’t give a frig about Sinnot’s heredity.
1968
A. Myrer
Eagle
61: Ain’t worth a frig.
1988
J. Collins
Rock Star
328: I don’t give a frig.
2002
J. McGahern
That They May Face Rising Sun
(2003) 119: “If the thing was to break down now we’d be able to get up what’s left with the forks.” “What about my poor meadows?” “You wouldn’t care a frig.”
4
. (a partial euphemism for)
the fuck
definition 1, under
FUCK
,
noun
.
1944
A. Kapelner
Lonely Boy Blues
91: And who the frig is Sam Duncan?
1948
I. Wolfert
Act of Love
239: Here the frig we go again.
1964
C. Howe
Valley of Fire
98: Leave him the frig alone.
1978
R. De Christoforo
Grease
96: And who the frig are you?
1997
A. Khan-Din
East is East
(rev. ed.) ii. v. 71: Who the frig do you think you are coming in here telling me my house isn’t good enough for your daughters.
frig
verb
1
. [a specialization of the obsolete Standard English sense ‘to rub or chafe’] to masturbate.
1598
J. Florio
Worlde of Wordes
139/1:
Fricciare
…to frig, to wriggle, to tickle.
ca
1650
in J. Wardroper
Love & Drollery
(1969) 197: And lest her sire should not thrust home/She frigged her father in her mother’s womb.
1680
Lord Rochester in
Oxford English Dictionary Supp.
: Poor pensive lover, in this place, Would Frigg upon his Mothers Face.
ca
1684
in Ash-bee
Biblio.
II 333: All the rest pull out their dildoes and frigg in point of honour.
ca
1730
in E. J. Burford
Bawdy Verse
(1983) 254:
You
know, at fifty-five,/A man can only
frigg
her!
1734
in G. Legman
No Laughing Matter
(1975) III 18: Assembled, and Frigged upon the Test Platter.
ca
1716–46
in J. S. Farmer & W. E. Henley
Slang & Its Analogues
III 74: So to a House of office…a School-Boy does repair, To…fr— his P— there.
1785
F. Grose
Classical Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue: To frig.
To be guilty of the crime of self-pollution.
1835
in J. E. Valle
Rocks & Shoals
(1980) 167:
Question
. Did you ever frig Lt. Burns?
A.
Yes—
Q.
How often?
A.
five or six times.
1865
Capt. E. Sellon
New Epicurean
13: I frigged and kissed their fragrant cunnies.
ca
1866
Romance of Lust
27: Fortunately, I had never frigged myself.
1879
Harlequin Prince Cherrytop
29: Better frig, howe’er the mind it shocks,/Than from promiscuous fucking catch the pox.
1909
J. Joyce in
Selected Letters
182: You… frigged me slowly till I came off through your fingers.
1940
J. Del Torto
Graffiti Transcript
(Kinsey Institute): My finger against his asshole.… I pushed it up and began to frig him.
1957
A. Myrer
Big War
361 [refers to WWII]: There’ll be no friggin’ in the riggin’…and no poopin’ on the poop-deck.
1968
“A. D’Arcangelo”
Homosexual Handbook
209: While you’re approaching from the rear, you can reach around and frig her clitoris with a free hand.
1970
Peters
Sex Newspapers
4: I began frigging myself even harder.
2002
R. Williams
Sing yer Heart out for Lads
ii. 65: Barry I’d give Posh Spice a fucking good seeing to I would. Fuck her till she screams. I’d strip off all her clothes, her damp and sticky knickers, I’d lay her down on the floor, frig her pussy with my finger, rubbing away at her clit, till she had an orgasm. Then I’d give her a fuck, long lingering fuck.
2
.
a
. to copulate; (
hence
) to copulate with. [The earliest quotations—variants of the same ribald song—involve word play on the obsolete Standard English sense ‘to move about restlessly; wiggle’, and suggest that the current sense arose as a euphemism; note that as early as
ca
1650 the word seems to have been regarded as coarse and to be avoided.]
ca
1610
in E. J. Burford
Bawdy Verse
(1983) 65: Faine woulde I try how I could frig/Up and downe, up and downe, up and downe,/Fain would I try how I could Caper.
ca
1650
in J. Wardroper
Love & Drollery
(1969) 186: Fain would I go both up and down…/No child is fonder of the gig/Than I to dance a merry jig./Fain would I try how I could —.
ca
1684
in H. N. Cary
Sexual Vocabulary
II: You frigg as though you were afraid to hurt.
1865
Capt. E. Sellon
New Epicurean
19: I had flung her on her back on the hay and was frigging away at her maidenhead.
1888
Stag Party
71: Why is the firing of an outhouse like flies frigging? It is arson on a small scale.
ca
1889
E. Field
Boastful Yak
: She would have been frigged, but he reneagued.
1918–19
in M. B. Carey, Jr.
Mlle. from Armentières
II (unpaged): The first Division is having a time,/Frigging the Fraus along the Rhine.
1916–22
H. N. Cary
Sexual Vocabulary
I under
copulation
:
Frigging like a mink
. To perform with vigor.
frigging like a rabbit
. To have great capacity.
1922
H.L. Mencken in T. P. Riggio
Dreiser-Mencken Letters
II 463: But frigging, as you must know, is invariably unlawful, save under ecclesiastical permit.
1922
T. E. Lawrence
The Mint
(1955) 155: [It sounded] like a pack of skeletons frigging on a tin roof.
1927
in E. Wilson
Twenties
413: Story about the fellow whose girl kept on eatin’ an apple all the time he was friggin’ her.
1927
Immortalia
32: The Khan would rather frig than fight.
1930
Lyra Ebriosa
12: We’ll go over and do some friggin’;/Dollar and a half will pay your fee.
1934
in V. Randolph
Pissing in Snow
88: She was better frigging than the other girl, so he diddled her twice.
1938
“Justinian”
Americana Sexualis
23:
Frig
(
Frick
). v. To copulate with.… Often used as euphemistic expletive for the phrase “Fuck it!”
1942
W. L. McAtee
Supplement to Grant Co.
4 [refers to 1890s]:
Frig,
v., copulate.
1942
in G. Legman
Limerick
(1954) 18: A young wife…/Preferred frigging to going to mass.
1944
in P. Smith
Letters from Father
426: He would “frig” her himself.
1951
W. Styron
Lie down in Darkness
(1992) vii. 389: Christine say she want to frig wid me.
1969
R. Jessup
Sailor
6: Better than you, letting him come up here while I’m at work and frigging from morning til night, probably.
1998
S. Waters
Tipping Velvet
xii. 267: I had not
fucked
her, we had not
frigged
.
b
. (used as an expletive); “screw”; to hell with; (
hence
) to disregard utterly. [Frequently regarded as a partial euphemism for
FUCK
,
verb
, definition 2a.]
1879
Pearl
103: Two prisoners were brought in.… The Sergeant requested orders regarding them. The Major merrily answered: “Oh, take
them away and frig them!”
1905
in J. Joyce
Letters
II. 104: Cosgrave says it’s unfair for you to frig the one idea about love which he had before he met you, and say “You have educated him too much.”
1929–35
J. T. Farrell
Judgment Day
629: Phrigg you, Catherine!
1936
S. Kingsley
Dead End
691:
Spit
. Frig you!
Drina…
I’ll crack you…you talk like that!
1938
J. O’Hara
Hope of Heaven
131: Frig dat.
1940
L. Zinberg
Walk Hard, Talk Loud
133: Aw, frig it, if I hadn’t been expecting a fight…it wouldn’t of happened.
1946
W. L. Gresham
Nightmare Alley
20: Frig him, the Bible-spouting bastard.
1948
I. Wolfert
Act of Love
155: Frig them.
Ibid.
399: The Navy was still saying, Frig you Joe, I’m okay.
1949
A. I. Bezzerides
Thieves’ Market
23: Frig Mom, let her try to stop me.
1953
W. Manchester
City of Anger
116: Frig trouble, I always say. Better frig it before it frigs you.
1956
G. Metalious
Peyton Place
358: “Frig you,” said Kenny hostilely.
1965
C. Himes
Cotton comes to Harlem
(1988) xiv. 98: Deke looked up at him as though from a great distance. He looked as though he didn’t care about anything any more. “Frig you,” he said.
1970
M. Gattzden
Black Vendetta
102: Let’s frig it.
1980
J. McA-leer & B. Dickson
Unit Pride
96: Frig ’em all and their mothers too. All but six and leave them for pallbearers.
1982
P. Redmond
Brookside
((Mersey TV transmission script) Episode 6.) 21:
Bongo
. We could always go down town.
Ducksie
. Frig that. Too bleedin’ cold.
1992
J. Cartwright
Rise & Fall of Little Voice
i. 9: When am I this morning, the Okay Corral or what? Frig me. Don’t put loads of bloody sugar in yours an all.