Did your mom ever wash your mouth out with soap when you were a rambunctious little scamp? If she did, you definitely know the childish joy of discovering “bad” words for the first time. Naughty language isn’t a modern novelty, and a 1785 dictionary of vulgarities proves it. These bad words of the past aren’t very taboo these days — just hilarious, and surprisingly important.
“A Classical Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue” is, fortunately, exactly what it sounds like. Created in 1785 by Francis Grose, this book is a collection of more goofy vulgarities than you could ever come up with. Grose created his repository after being inspired, in a way, by Samuel Johnson’s great “Dictionary of the English Language,” published in 1755. Johnson left out a heaping pile of slang words and phrases that he didn’t consider worthy. Grose, on the other hand, wanted to give those stragglers a home. And we’re glad he did.
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