Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue – Day 159

The Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue was first published at the end of the eighteenth century, and given that the current health crisis is giving too much time to read books, I thought I’d pick a daily word from it until I got bored….

Horse’s Meal

This is mainly a northern and Scottish phrase and it never caught on more widely, but it’s defined as “a meal without drinking”. It is meant with reference to meaning no drink at all, whether alcoholic or not, and it’s perhaps surprising that it didn’t become used more widely as there’s no other way in English (that I know of) which describes this situation. It appears to have been used primarily at the end of the eighteenth century and then fell out of usage.