Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue – Day 209

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….

Mobility

This is defined as “the mob: a sort of opposite to nobility”, as opposed to the current meaning of ‘mobility’ relating to free movement which is a relatively new definition. And this would have likely been pronounced differently, so the ‘mob-ility’, a nice way of defining the different classes in society at the time.