A beginner’s guide to slinging insults with class and style: 19th century insults. That should be put back into circulation in the English language.

Hello again, dear reader.

Today's conversation is going to be quite unique as it is a list of 19th century insults that I think should be brought back in style. The idea for this conversation came about as a combination of reading and Isaac Bell novel by Clive Custer (their detective stories at all take place in the late 18th and early 19th century, and they have all sorts of unique phrases and language that the characters use offhandedly in a conversation even their insults sound literary and a lot more gentle than a string of expletives, which let's face it, no matter how expert you are at weaving together a string of expletives. They are still just very blunt words with no artistic expression. The other half of the idea for this conversation came from having a political conversation with a very good friend of mine about a certain political figure (who for safety reasons, I will not mention by name).

My friend started making jokes that they were going to go work for the American dictionary company. Just so they could learn some new words to aim towards their least favorite political figure as they said their favorite strain of expletives and then use so much lately. It was starting to lose its impact, so I started thinking about some of the language from the early 19th century that I had heard in the Isaac Bell novels I told my friend. A few of them and they laughed and started using them. So I began to wonder if I could find anymore unique and interesting insults and putdowns that would be a little more artistic and colorful, and maybe ever so slightly a little less harsh, and a little more literary; I have selected 50 of my favorite phrases that I think should be put back into circulation in the English language.

Now, dear reader, before you go getting all agitated about me saying that we need more insults in the English language. I am in no way trying to imply that you dear reader, or anyone else for that matter should go around insulting people on a regular basis. However, I feel that in those times when an insult or jab at someone's character is definitely called for. It should be a lot higher caliber and expression than just simply dropping a string of F. bombs in the direction of your adversary. So hopefully by the end of today's conversation to reader, you will have a new appreciation for the lost art of the 19th-century insult. And you too will start putting them back into circulation.

As Lesley M. M. Blume observes in Let’s Bring Back: The Lost Language Edition, while clothing fashions have a way of cycling in and out of popularity, when the sun sets on popular slang, it tends to remain buried forever. This isn’t always a bad thing — no one is jonesing for “Tubular!” and “Groovy!” to resurrect from the 1980s and 60s, respectively.
In some cases, however, where words have died, no equally worthy substitutes have risen in their places; this is particularly the case when it comes to our modern stock of insults and put-downs. If someone we meet or are apprised of in the news conducts themselves in an objectionable way, what words do we have at our disposable to call them? Jerk? Knucklehead? Perhaps we just resort to a set of tiresome, overused, meaningless expletives. Where’s the fun in that?
No, our storehouse of insults could surely use replenishing, and for this re-stocking operation there’s no better place to go than the slang of the 19^th century – a time of truly colorful and entertaining verbiage. These old-fashioned put-downs have a flair that modern insults lack — they’re clever, nuanced, descriptive, and quite amusing (at least to the issuer and those who overhear, if not to the receiver!).
Below there are 50 of my favorite old-time put-downs, with their original definitions pulled directly from dictionaries published more than a century back (with some slight tweaking for added clarity). Some have gone completely extinct from our language, while others are merely endangered; you may have heard them before, but they’re terribly underused. All are worthy of a revival.
I also included a section of unique insults issued by none other than Theodore Roosevelt — a man who never suffered fools, or white-livered weaklings, lightly.

 

 

1. Afternoon Farmer

A laggard; a farmer who rises late and is behind in his chores; hence, anyone who loses his opportunities.

2. All Hat and No Cattle

An empty boaster; a man who is all talk and no action.

3. Blunderbuss

A short gun, with a wide bore, for carrying slugs; also, a dumb, blundering fellow.

4. Cad

A mean fellow; a man trying to worm something out of another, either money or information.

5. Chatterbox or Clack-Box

An excessive, incessant talker or chatterer. “Clack-box” is the more derisive variation.

6. Chicken-Hearted

Cowardly, fearful.

7. Chuckle Head

Much the same as “buffle head,” “cabbage head,” “chowder head,” “cod’s head” — all signifying stupidity and weakness of intellect; a fool.

8. Cow-Handed

Awkward.

9. Death’s Head Upon a Mop-Stick

A poor, miserable, emaciated fellow. He looked as pleasant as the pains of death.

10. Duke of Limbs

A tall, awkward fellow.

11. Dunderhead

Blockhead.

12. Fop, Foppish, Foppling, Fop-doodle

A man of small understanding and much ostentation; a pretender; a man fond of show, dress, and flutter; an impertinent: foppery is derived from fop, and signifies the kind of folly which displays itself in dress and manners: to be foppish is to be fantastically and affectedly fine; vain; ostentatious; showy, and ridiculous: foppling is the diminutive of fop, a fool half-grown; a thing that endeavors to attract admiration to its pretty person, its pretty dress, etc. In composition it makes fop-doodle, a fool double-distilled; one that provokes ridicule and contempt, who thrusts himself into danger with no other chance than a sound beating for his pains.

13. Fribble

A trifler, idler, good-for-nothing fellow; silly and superficial.

14. Fussbudget

A nervous, fidgety person.

15. Gadabout

A person who moves or travels restlessly or aimlessly from one social activity or place to another, seeking pleasure; a trapesing gossip; as a housewife seldom seen at home, but very often at her neighbor’s doors.

16. Gasser

Braggart.

17. Gentleman of Four Outs

When a vulgar, blustering fellow asserts that he is a gentleman, the retort generally is, “Yes, a gentleman of four outs,” that is, without wit, without money, without credit, and without manners.

18. Ginger-Snap

A hot-headed person. 

19. Go-Alonger

A simple, easy person, who suffers himself to be made a fool of, and is readily persuaded to any act or undertaking by his associates, who inwardly laugh at his folly.

20. Go By the Ground

A short person, man or woman.

21. Gollumpus

Large, clumsy fellow.

22. Greedy Guts

A covetous or gluttonous person.

23. Grumbletonian

A discontented person; one who is always railing at the times.

24. Heathen Philosopher

One whose buttocks may be seen through his pocket-hole; this saying arose from the old philosophers, many of whom despised the vanity of dress to such a point as often to fall into the opposite extreme.

25. Milksop

A piece of bread soaked in milk; a soft, effeminate, girlish man; one who is devoid of manliness.

26. Minikin

A little man or woman.

27. Mollycoddle

An effeminate man, one who malingers amongst the women.

28. Nigmenog

A very silly fellow.

29. Nincompoop

A fool.

30. Ninnyhammer

A simpleton.

31. Poltroon

An utter coward.

32. Rascal

A rogue or villain.

33. Rattlecap

An unsteady, volatile person.

34. Ruffian

A brutal fellow; a pugilistic bully.

35. Rumbumptious

Pompous, haughty.

36. Sauce-Box

A bold or forward person.

37. Scalawag/Scallywag

A rascal.

38. Seek-Sorrow

One who contrives to give himself vexation; a self-tormentor; a hypochondriac.

39. Scamp

A worthless fellow; a rascal.

40. Scoundrel

A man void of every principle of honor.

41. Shabbaroon

An ill-dressed shabby fellow; also, a mean-spirited person.

42. Skinflint

A miser; a covetous wretch, one who, if possible would take the skin off a flint.

43. Slug-A-Bed

Parasite; one that cannot rise in the morning. 

44. Sneaksby

A mean-spirited fellow; a sneaking, cowardly man.

45. Spoony

Foolish, half-witted, nonsensical; it is usual to call a very prating shallow fellow, a “rank spoon.”

46. Stingbum

A stingy or ungenerous person.

47. Unlicked Cub

A loutish youth who has never been taught manners; from the tradition that a bear’s cub, when brought into the world, has no shape or symmetry until its mother licks it into form with her tongue; ill-trained, uncouth, and rude.

48. White-Livered

Cowardly, malicious.

49. Word Grubbers

Verbal critics; and also, persons who use hard words in common discourse.

50. Wrinkler

A person prone to lying.

Theodore Roosevelt’s Insults

• “Being who belongs to the cult of non-virility”
• “Classical ignoramus”
• “Fragrant man swine”
• “Handshake like a wilted petunia”
• “Infernal skunk”
• “Little emasculated mass of inanity”
• “A mind that functions at six guinea-pig power”
• “Miserable little snob”
• “Thorough-paced scoundrel”
• “Well-meaning, pinheaded, anarchistic crank”

“White-livered weakling”