Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue – Day Thirty-Seven

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

Bowsprit

The dictionary defines this as “the nose, from its being the most projecting part of the human face, as the bowsprit is of a ship”.

Another one of those words which is slowly going out of use. However, the word ‘bow’ is still listed as another word for noise, so perhaps this is the same derivative.