Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue – Day 224

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….

Noddle

This word is defined by Grose as meaning “the head” and it’s still in use today in the form of phrases such as “use your noddle” and also with a financial company recently taking the name.

Still in use, but it has been declining over the last century. As for the word origin, it’s known that it was used during the later Middle English period, but none of the dictionaries have found where it came from…..