Glossary
by Katherine S.
All the words you don’t know and the insults you’ll want to use!
Act 1
Act 2
Act 3
Act 4
Act 5
Fat-witted: stupid
Sack: sherry
Leaping-houses: brothels
Buff jerkin: leather military jacket
‘Sblood: an oath, “by Christ’s blood”
Zounds: an oath, “by God’s wounds”
Sirrah: “sir”
Holp: helped
Pouncet box: small box filled with a fragrant substance
Parmacety: waxy substance used as medical ointment
Saltpeter: main ingredient in gunpowder
Choler: anger
Pismires: ants
Fat-kidneyed rascal: bum
Caterpillars: derogatory term for citizens viewed as “feeding off the commonwealth”
Gorbellied: potbellied, fat
Bacons: “i.e. fatties”
Buffets: “fisticuffs”
Esperance: the Percy family motto, meaning ‘hope’
Mammets: dolls
Whoreson round man: overweight chap
Peppered: killed
Knotty-pated: blockheaded
Thou claybrained guts, thou knotty-pated fool, thou whoreson, obscene, greasy tallow-catch: stupid slimeball
Pizzle: “penis (dried to make a whip)”
Starveling, elf-skin, dried neat’s tongue, bull’s pizzle, stockfish: degenerate
Micher: truant, absentee
Naughty velvet: “bad boy”
Halter: hangman’s noose
Burning cressets: stars or comets, representative of a newborn’s greatness
Bootless: unsuccessful
Agues: chills and fevers
Skimble-skamble stuff: nonsense
Cates: delicacies
Start of spleen: tantrum, caprice
Ignis fatuus: will-o’-the-wisp
Younker: youngster
Jack: “silly, saucy fellow”
Beaver: helmet
Soused gurnet: small, pickled fish
Toasts-and-butter: “soft citizens”
Gyves: ankle fetters
Forsooth: a mild oath
Corrivals: associates
Chewet: jackdaw, loud-mouth
Hurlyburly innovation: “chaotic change”
Scutcheon: sign displaying a deceased individual’s coat of arms
Catechism: “a book teaching basic religious principles”
Spleen: whim
Ta’en: contracted, like an illness
Succor: help
Brook: endure
Termagant: “savage”