Fly-Golding, Beever, and God Almighty’s Cow

You’re listening to A Way with Words, the show about language and how we use it.

I’m Grant Barrett.

And I’m Martha Barnette.

Grant, as you know, one of my favorite things to do is to find old dictionaries and just dig through them.

Yeah, dictionary diving, Martha.

Yes, yes.

Not necessarily the mainstream ones.

But, for example, I was looking at a dictionary of the Sussex dialect. That’s from down there on the southeastern coast of England, right there on the English Channel.

A Dictionary of the Sussex Dialect by Reverend W.D. Parrish. This was from 1875.

And what I love about looking at dictionaries like this is that they give you a little peek at daily life from back in the day. You know, whether it’s about food and drink or beliefs and superstitions or opinions or gossip.

I mean, one of the words that I came across almost immediately under the bees was the word beaver, B-E-E-V-E-R, which means an 11 o’clock luncheon. I just love that.

You know, come over for a beaver.

Oh, nice.

It’s because you eat some of the bees.

Exactly.

I was thinking, does this have to do with drinking? But no, I’m pretty sure that you’re right.

It’s plural beef.

Yes.

Yes, I think you’re right.

Let me share one more with you that just, I don’t know, it just set my imagination off.

There’s a term in the dictionary, Bishop Barnaby.

Bishop Barnaby.

So not a real person, but…

Correct.

Is this just like the name for the head goat in the herd?

Right.

I don’t know.

The bellwether.

No, in parts of Sussex, the ladybug, the insect, is called a Bishop Barnaby. And it goes on to say that in other parts, it’s called the fly golding, or get this, God’s Almighty Cow.

And it describes how children set the insect on their finger and sing, Bishop, Bishop Barnaby, tell me when my wedding shall be. If it be tomorrow day, ope your wings and fly away.

Aw, I love it.

There are lots of rhymes around ladybugs. There’s something mysterious about a ladybug with the bright colors and the speckles and their little round bodies.

Right, and I can just see you standing there, you know, with a little bug on your finger, just hoping it’s going to fly away and indicate that, you know, it’s not that they love you not, it’s that they love you.

We will share more from this Sussex dialect dictionary later in the show, and we’ll link to it on our website.

And in the meantime, you can talk to us about language. Call or text toll-free in the United States or Canada, 877-929-9673.