Dictionaries – Page 3

Bondage Dictionary (Part 2)

In this Part 2 of my “Bondage Dictionary” I continue with words which I consider pertinent to the industry of human bondage. The emphasis is on the institution as it existed in the New World.

Immigrant Servant: A general term used to describe all immigrants who came to the colonies as servants; including convict servants, indentured servants and redemptioners.

Indenture: A contract between a master and an indentured servant specifying the length of time required to serve in order to pay for the trans-Atlantic passage. The indenture often would promise free land or money when the contract was terminated.

Indenture Servants: Indentured servants were Europeans, mostly between 18 and 25 years old, who contracted themselves to an employer in the New World for between four and seven years, after which time they were free to work for themselves. The term is also used to describe the practice in other circumstances such as Africans sent to Jamaica in the nineteenth century and Indians exported to South Africa in the nineteenth century.

Indian Servant: A Native American employed by a European as a servant.

Interloper: Slave traders operating in violation of monopoly company privileges.

Journeyman: A competent tradesman who has finished the training period of apprenticeship.

Kidnapped: The forcible seizure of a free people with the intent of selling them into slavery. It applies to both the capture of Africans and European.

Leeward Islands: The Caribbean Islands of Dominica, Guadeloupe, Montserrat, Antigua, Nevis, St. Kitts, Barbuda, St. Eustatius, St. Bartholomew, St. Martin, Anguilla and the Virgin Islands.

Maid Servant: A female indentured servant and came to mean an unmarried female servant.

Master: In European bondage, it was an individual who owned the labor of an immigrant servant for a number of years. In African bondage it was used to denote the owner of the slaves. For apprentices it was the person who trained.

Men: Generally, African slave traders classified men as taller than four feet four inches older than 13-14 years of age.

Merchant: An individual who purchased immigrant servants in Europe and when the servants arrived in the colonies assigned or sold their contracts to the colonists.

Middle Passage: The trans-Atlantic voyage between Africa and the Americas. The Middle Passage represents both a bridge and a divider between the Old and New Worlds.

Mistress: A female master.

Mortgage Value of Slaves: The collateral value of a slave or group of slaves used to secure a debt.

Outward Passage: The first leg of a slaving voyage, from the port of departure to Africa. Crewmen worked on the outward passage, preparing the vessel to receive human cargo by configuring below-deck prisons.

Overseer: The person on the plantation who was paid to organize and manage the work of slaves.

Plantation: A large estate or farm on which cash crops and provisions are grown, usually by slave workers. Plantations constituted the destination of the majority of enslaved Africans.

Plantocracy: The settlers who developed plantations in the Caribbean into successful businesses; the name combines their local rank and the status to which they aspired.

Political Rebel: A person whose political views were in opposition to the government. Political Rebels were often transported to the colonies as punishment.

Prime Slaves: Healthy slaves, men and women, between the ages of 18 and 30. Slave traders desired prime slaves and paid premiums for them.

Privilege Slave: An enslaved African given to the ship’s officer by the slave ship owner as a special honor or privilege.

Redemptioner: An individual who travelled from Europe to the American colonies without paying. Upon arrival, they would be redeemed by someone for payment. The passage was usually paid for by friends or relatives in the colonies. If the funds were not available then the redemptioner was sold as an indentured servant. Also termed Free-willers.

Runaway Servant: Immigrant servants often ran away from their masters to escape their contract. If caught they were punished harshly with extra years attached to their original contract.

Tomorrow, I conclude my “Bondage Dictionary” with words I consider important in understanding the institution of slavery in all of its forms.

Bondage Dictionary (Part 1)

20 Sep By Dwight Leave a Comment

The world of slavery is very foreign to us today. For this reason, when we read classic English literature or court records, we need a dictionary to sort through the mind-set of the time. It was a very strange world! This first of three part blogs focuses on words associated with the bondage of Africans, Europeans, East Indians and Native Americans. Only selected words have been chosen for presentation. The focus of this dictionary is terms from the seventeenth century English colonies through the enslavement of African Americans in the United States. There was crossover between many colonial words in regards to both white and black slavery, as the institution was still being defined in the courts during the 1600s.

It’s important to remember how huge the trafficking in human bondage was in the New World, with the Irish being in the middle of it on both sides of the chains. All the European powers with New World colonies were involved. This dictionary will not list some of the more obvious words.

Abandonment: When a slaveholder deserts his or her slaves.

Absentee Owner: A plantation or estate owner who did not live on and manage the property directly.

Absolute Slave: A slave for life; not a term slave.

Adults: African men and women generally older than 13 or 14 years of age or taller than four feet four inches. Specific age ratios differ by time and place.

Agent: In the indentured servant trade, an agent recruited the servants and redemptioners. The agents commonly sold or assigned their rights to these servants to labor starved American colonists.

Agricultural Laborer: After men completed several years as an agricultural servant, married, and established households, they became agricultural laborers.

Agricultural Servant: Young single men who lived in rural areas were commonly contracted to serve farmers for one year periods. This time served as agricultural training and certain aspects of this practice evolved into the indentured servants industry.

Americas: North America, Central America, South America and the Caribbean Islands.

Angola: see West Central Africa

Apprentice: Individuals contracted to serve a master for a specific number of years to learn a trade usually for a low wage. Parts of this practice evolved into the indentured servant practice. Often in an indenture contract, the word apprentice signals that a child is being indentured, not necessarily that the child would be learning a trade.

Apprenticeship: The period an individual was bound under contract as an apprentice, usually until the age of 21.

Barbadosed: A seventeenth century term for white dissidents who were shipped into slavery in the Americas for political resistance. Originally used for dissidents transported to Barbados.

Bight of Benin: Slaving region defined as coving modern day eastern Ghana, Togo, Benin and western Nigeria. Europeans called it the Slave Coast.

Bight of Biafra: Slaving region defined as covering the coastline of modern day western Nigeria, Cameroon, Equatorial Guinea and northern Gabon. The region includes Bimbia Island, Cameroon and the Gulf of Guinea islands Principe and Sao Tome.

Bocal Slaves: Newly arrived slaves who spoke languages different from the common language in the place of import. In the African context, bocals (Portuguese) or bozals (Spanish) were slaves imported from the interior to coastal trading sites. In the Americans context, bocals were slaves imported directly from Africa.

Boys: Immature male slaves. Slave traders classified African boys as shorter than four feet four inches or younger than 13-14 years of age.

Carib: The indigenous people who inhabited the Caribbean Islands and parts of the neighboring mainland.

Chattel Slavery: A form of slavery introduced by Europeans in which the slave is treated as property belonging to the owner with no rights. The children of chattel slaves were also slaves.

Children: Immature slaves, defined in the British slave trade as being shorter than four feet four inches or younger than 13-14 years.

Clearance: Primary port where slaving voyages began.

Coffle: A group of slaves chained together in a line commonly used by slavers in the eighteenth century.

Contract: Also called an indenture, the contract was where the emigrant agreed to work as a servant without pay for a fixed number of years in return for passage to the New World.

Convict Servant: Criminals in the British Isles who accepted exile were given mandatory labor from seven to fourteen years as an alternative to execution or prison. They were transported to the American colonies from 1615 to 1776 and to Australia from 1787 through 1868.

Demerara: Coastal region of modern day Guyana.

Departures: Departures refer to ports where voyages originated. Ships would clear customs “for Africa” and depart from Europe or the Americans.

Disembark(ation): To force slaves from vessels in port. Slaves could be disembarked at several ports in the Americas, as captains often traveled to various ports searching for the best price for their cargo.

Domestic Servant: A man or woman who worked for hire in a person’s home for pay. Domestic servants were different than indentured servants.

Domestic Slave: A slave who works in a household rather than in the fields.

Driver: An overseer of slaves. The driver was another slave or a European.

Duty Boy: A seventeenth century term for white child slaves, orphans, and those taken from parents and shipped into slavery in the Americas. Duty Boys were considered the living dead as their enslavement in Virginia and the West Indies was basically a death sentence.

East India Indians: A Colonial American term to mean people from the Indian subcontinent; especially in Maryland and Virginia. They arrived as indentured servants or slaves from England, and intermarried with the Free Blacks or white indentured servants.

Elderly Free Black: A free person of color sixty years of age or over.

Elderly Slaves: A slave sixty years of age and over.

Embark(ation): Loading African captives into a slave ship. Slaves were often be kept below decks for weeks after embarkation, waiting for the slaving master to procure a full cargo.

Estate: A large area of land, used for agriculture with a large main house owned by an individual or family.

Exile: An individual expelled from his or her native country by the government for opposing views.

Factors: Men who traded in their own name, possessed the goods, and usually did not reveal the names of the people for whom they were acting. Factors were the opposite of agents.

Field Slave: A slave who plants, tends and harvests crops on a plantation.

Free Black: Sometimes referred to as “free persons of color” or “free color’ these were either free slaves, African Americans who were born free or mixed-race. Sometimes referred to as Free Color or Free Person of Color.

Girls: Immature female slaves. Slave traders classified African girls as shorter than four feel four inches or younger than 13-14 years of age.

Gold Coast: Slaving region in the modern day country of Ghana.

Guinea Coast: The West African coast.

Guineaman: A common term for a slave ship. Sometimes the term “Guinea Ship” was used.

Headright: A grant of land to individuals responsible for transporting immigrants to Colonial America. The headright was usually 50 acres, and they motivated investors to transport servants to the colonies.

Hired Servant: A servant who received wages for labor and had power to select the master and time to serve. They were not always immigrants although many immigrant servants after their freedom did become hired servants.

Hispaniola: A major Caribbean Island containing both the Dominican Republic and Haiti.

Homeward Passage: The voyage leg returning a vessel to its home port.

Tomorrow in Part 2, I will continue my “Bondage Dictionary” with words I consider to be important for the study of all facets of slavery.

The Un-churched Dictionary of the Churched (1811) – Part 2

10 Sep By Dwight Leave a Comment

In Part 2 of my Un-Churched Dictionary of the Churched, I continue with terms from 1811 either draw from church terminology or meant to reflect church culture. Many are frankly crude, but this was the world of the common folk who seldom had a voice. These words also provide a window into the world of the un-churched or moderately churched in how they saw the religion of their day.

Japanned: Ordained. To be japanned is to enter into holy orders or become a clergyman. This meant to put on black cloth, the color of the Japan ware.

Jehu: To drive Jehu like is to drive furiously; taken from the King of Israel a famous charioteer.

Jesuitical: Sly, evasive, equivocal; as in “A Jesuitical answer.”

Jew: 1) An over reaching dealer or extortioner. 2) A tradesman who has no faith and will not give credit.

Jew Bail: Insufficient bail.

Jew’s Eye: That’s worth a Jew’s eye; a pleasant or agreeable sight.

Joseph: 1) A woman’s great coat. 2) A sheepish bashful young fellow an allusion to Joseph who fled from Potiphar’s wife.

Kill Devil: New still burnt rum.

Kill Priest: Port wine.

Mess John: A Scotch Presbyterian teacher or parson.

Moses: “To stand Moses” means a man has another man’s illegitimate child fathered upon him and he is obliged by the parish to maintain the child.

Nazakene Foretop: The foretop of a wig made in imitation of Christ’s head of hair, as represented by the painters and sculptors.

Neck Verse: Formerly the persons claiming the benefit of clergy were obliged to read a verse in a Latin manuscript psalter; this saved them from the gallows. It was Psalms 51:1.

New Light: A Methodist; one of the New Light.

Nick: The Devil, sometimes called Old Nick.

Non-Con: A nonconformist, Presbyterian or any other dissenter.

Nose Gent: A nun.

Pantile Shop: A Presbyterian, or other dissenting meeting house, frequently covered with pantiles. Also called a cock-pit.

Parish: His stockings are of two parishes. In other words they are not fellows.

Parish Bull: A parson.

Parish Soldier: A jeering name for a militiaman. It comes from the substitutes being frequently hired by the parish from which one of its inhabitants is drawn.

Parson: A guide post, hand or finger post by the road side for directing travelers. It is compared to a parson because like him, it sets people in the right way. See Guide Post

Piss Prophet: A physician who judges of the diseases of his patients solely by the inspection of their urine.

Pontius Pilate: A pawnbroker.

Postilion of the Gospel: A parson who hurries over the service.

Pot Converts: Proselytes to the Catholic Church made by the distribution of victuals and money.

Priest Ridden: Governed by a priest or priests.

Pudding Sleeves: A parson.

Reader Merchants: Pickpockets, chiefly young Jews who ply about the bank to steal the pocket books of persons who have just received their dividends there.

Red Letter Day: A saint’s day or holiday, marked in the calendars with red letters. Also used as “Red Letter Men” which referred to Roman Catholics from their observation of the saint days marked in the red letters.

Resurrection Men: Persons employed by the students in anatomy to steal dead bodies out of church yards.

Saint Geoffrey’s Day: Never, there being no saint of that name, the term means tomorrow-come-never.

Saint Luke’s Bird: An ox. The evangelist St. Luke always being represented with an ox.

Shit Sack: A vulgar term for a non-conformist.

Smous: A German Jew.

Snub Devil: A parson.

Solfa: A parish clerk.

Soul Doctor/Driver: A parson.

Spiritual Flesh Broker: A parson.

Spoil Pudding: A parson who preaches long sermons, keeping the congregation in church till the puddings are overdone.

Steeple House: A name given to the church [Church of England] by Dissenters.

Stewed Quaker: Burnt rum, with a piece of butter. An American remedy for a cold.

Swaddlers: The Irish name for a Methodist.

Thorough Churchman: A person who goes in at one door of a church, and out at the other without stopping.

Tickle Text: A parson.

Tu Quoque: The mother of all saints.

Tub Thumper: A Presbyterian parson.

Wet Quaker: A member of the Society of Friends who has no objection to wine.

The Un-Churched Dictionary of the Churched (1811) – Part 1

9 Sep By Dwight Leave a Comment

In family history we often look at the world through the lenses of church pastors and their clerks. That is because they left behind the records we study. We seldom consider the viewpoint of the many un-churched or moderately churched common folks. This segment of society would have been the working class rather than the educated at the top of society. The common folk seldom left behind the records in which they were mentioned.

In 1811, Francis Grose compiled a Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue: www.gutenberg.org/cache/epub/5402/pg5402.html It was British Isles slang drawn from words and terms common in England, Ireland, Scotland and Wales. He also drew from the Dictionary of Thieving Slang (1736) by Nathan Bailey (called the Canting Dictionary), and popular literature from the period. In ways, he probably never realized, looking back at this work, he actually gave the common folk a voice. However, from a genealogical perspective, works such as this are meaningless unless you know the specific word in question. However, if a work such as this can be compiled by subject, then you have a valuable research tool into the mind and times of your ancestors.

In this case, I have sorted out religious and church associated words to create a mini-slang dictionary which I have dubbed “The Un-Churched Dictionary of the Churched.” Some of the terms and concepts you will find crass and offensive by our standards. However, judge the slang within a historical context. In this case the common language reflects a time period which was full of religious strife, prejudice, and massive social injustices throughout the British Isles. The common views on religion cannot be separated out from the geography and culture of 1811.

Some of the terms you will find are straight religious. Some of the meanings are meant to be derogatory, while others are just a description as to how the common folk saw things. While there’s probably a slant towards Anglicanism, do not think that tradition gets off the hook with the common people. The Anabaptists, Anglicans, “Dissenters,” Jews, Methodists, Quakers and Roman Catholics all have terms referring back to them. Some are mild, and others are just – well, vulgar. Sometimes terms were borrowed from church culture and given a new meaning. At other times, slang words were invented to denote a church practice. It’s a fascinating piece of history. In my compilation, I have taken some liberties to make some definitions understandable for modern readers.

Adam’s Ale: Water.

Amen Curler: A parish clerk.

Aminadab: A jeering name for a Quaker.

Anabaptist: A pickpocket caught in the fact and punished with the discipline of the pump or horse pond.

Apostles: To maneuver the apostles would mean to “Rob from Peter to pay Paul;” or borrow money from one man to pay another.

Autem: A church.

Autem Cackletub: A conventicle or meetinghouse for dissenters.

Antem Dippers: Anabaptists.

Antem Quavers: Quakers.

Autem Quaver Tub: A Quakers’ meetinghouse.

Badge Coves: Parish pensioner.

Baptized/Christened: Rum, brandy or any other spirits what have been lowered with water.

Bible: A boatswain’s great axe. It is a sea term.

Bible Oath: Among the common people, it was supposed to be more binding than an oath taken on the New Testament only. The logic being the entire Bible was a bigger book.

Bishop: A mixture of wine and water, into which is put a roasted orange.

Black Spy: The Devil.

To Box the Jesuit and Get Cock Roaches: A sea term for masturbation.

Breast Fleet: A Roman Catholic. The term comes from the custom of beating their breasts in the confession of their sins. See Brisket Beater and Craw Thumper.

Breeches Bible: An edition of the Bible printed in 1598, wherein it is said that Adam and Eve sewed fig leaves together and made themselves breeches.

Brisket Beater: A Roman Catholic. Also see Breast Fleet and Craw Thumper.

Canticle: A parish clerk.

Canting: Preaching with a whining, affected tone.

Christening: Erasing the name of the true marker form a stolen watch and engraving a fictitious one in its place.

Christian: A tradesman who has faith and will give credit.

Christian Poney: A chairman.

Chuck Farthing: A parish clerk.

Church Work: Said of any work that advances slowly.

Churchyard Cough: A cough that is likely to terminate in death.

Corinthians: Frequenters of brothels. Also an impudent brazen faced man.

Craw Thumpers: Roman Catholics, so called because of the custom of beating their breasts during the confession of sins. Also see Brisket Beaters and Breast Fleet.

Devil: 1) A printer’s errand boy. 2) The gizzard of a turkey or fowl, scored, peppered, salted and broiled. This definition comes from being hot in the mouth.

Devil’s Books: Cards.

Devil Catcher/Driver: A parson. See Snub Devil.

Devil Drawer: A miserable painter.

Devil’s Guts: A surveyor’s chain.

Devilish: An epithet where one is made to agree with every quality of thing.

Dingey Christian: A mulatto.

Dippers: Anabaptists

Finger Post: A parson so called because he points out a way to others which he never goes himself. Like the finger post, he points out a way he has never been, and probably will never go, i.e. the way to heaven.

Gluepot: A parson, from joining men and women together in matrimony.

Gospel Shop: A church

Hell: A taylor’s repository for his stolen goods.

Hell-Born Babe: A lewd graceless youth, one naturally of a wicked disposition.

Hell Cat: A furious scolding woman.

Hell Hound: A wicked abandoned fellow.

Holy Water: Holy water in the Roman Catholic tradition had the virtue to chase away the Devil and his imps. So if someone loves someone likes the Devil loves holy water, it means that person is hated mortally.

Hums: Persons at church; a congregation.

Hum Box: A pulpit.

Tomorrow I conclude with Part 2 of my 1811 “Un-Churched Dictionary of the Churched.”

The Parliamentary Gazetteer of Ireland (1844)

25 Aug By Dwight Leave a Comment

If you are writing a pre-famine family history, or simply wanting to know what life was like in a particular area, then The Parliamentary Gazetteer of Ireland (1844) may be what you are looking for. This is a ten volume set arranged alphabetically. This work is found several places online, so it is best to Google the title of the book and see which database you want to consult.

This work is similar in scope to the two volume Topographical Dictionary of Ireland (1837): www.libraryireland.com/topog/index.php by Samuel Lewis, which I have already blogged about. The two sources together provide you with an excellent pre-Famine view of Ireland.

The gazetteer is written from the government point of view, so a parish entry will mean civil parish. However, Roman Catholic history and statistics will be listed under the civil parish. There are entries for counties, parishes, islands, towns and considerable villages, baronies, principal mountains, bays, all fishing harbors, all rivers, principal lakes, chief mines and mineral districts, on all villages which contain at least twenty houses, and hundreds of others which contain fewer, and principal rural antiquities to name some of the topics covered. This remains a true encyclopedia of pre-Famine Ireland. What is not listed are histories on individual townlands.

The entries all sorts of statistics taken from the 1831 and 1841 censuses. This in itself can provide you with hard to find information from which to develop your narrative, if you are writing a family history or conducting historical research.

A breakdown of the volumes are as follows: Volume 1 (A-Arm), Volume 2 (Arm-Car), Volume 3 (Car-Cus), Volume 4 (Dal-Gal), Volume 5 (Gal-Kil), Volume 6 (Kil-Mag), Volume 7 (Mag-Rap), Volume 8 (Rap-Tib), Volume 9 (Tib-You), Volume 10 (You-Z and Index).

Lewis’s Topographical Dictionary of Ireland

12 Aug By Dwight Leave a Comment

Whenever I need some quick pre-Famine background material in trying to put a family in their historical context, I go to the two volume work Topographical Dictionary of Ireland (1837): www.libraryireland.com/topog/index.php by Samuel Lewis. There are other dictionaries and gazetteers, but this is a good one to become acquainted. It has been reprinted, making it widely available in many libraries.

The majority of the entries in the book will be for villages, towns, cities, counties and parishes. They do not include townlands in this manner. It is written from a Protestant perspective, so the parishes mentioned are civil parishes. However, Catholic chapels and statistics are detailed.

I also use this source when I’m compiling a family history to publish. Sometimes, background information is hard to come by, especially for smaller places or for civil parishes in general. This dictionary does provide me a point from which I can write background history. For example, if I’m trying to determine how Patrick Sullivan met and then married Mary Kelly, and they were not from the same parish, this work will help. The section on the civil parishes where they lived will tell where the market towns were located and when the markets were held. That is usually my answer as to how they met when they didn’t live close to each other geographically. Remember, most of the common Irish were on foot and had limited mobility.

Lewis’s dictionary is a good launching point for your research. Just remember, it’s not the only resource of this type. I will talk about other dictionaries and gazetteers in the future.

Dictionary of Quaker Terms and Phrases (Part 3)

22 Jul By Dwight Leave a Comment

In this Part 3 of my Quaker Dictionary, I conclude this series on terms which are not necessarily self-explanatory. My hope is that Part 1-3 provide a brief reference to help you understand and appreciate the contributions out Quakers ancestors made worldwide.

Rightly Ordered: Those procedures for the conduct of Friends business, that encourage a Meeting to carry out its corporate activities under divine leading.

Seasoning: Taking the time to seek the Light rather than moving into a matter hastily.

Settled: All together under the leading of the Spirit.

Speak to One’s Condition: The experience of receiving a message directly from God or through another person, that touches another person at a deep, helps one solve a problem or make a right decision.

Standing Aside: An action taken by an individual who has reservations about a particular decision, but who also recognizes the decision is clearly supported by the Meeting.

Standing in the Way: A person who feels a spirit led objection to a decision or proposed action of the Meeting may stand in the way, thus preventing further action.

Stop in the Mind: An expression used by Friends when they feel uneasy and cannot follow a course of action.

A stop: Rather than a leading to do something, a stop is the sense that a Friend should not do something.

Testimony: 1) A positive testimony to God in the case of a deceased friend; 2) A special testimony of concern for a specific matter; 3) A testimony of disownment or disunity; 4) When used as “Testimonies,” this includes the Quaker principles of equality, peace, simplicity and truth.

Thee was favored: The preferred phrase for one Friend to offer another when their ministry has seemed particularly powerful and Spirit filled.

Threshing Session: A Meeting to consider in depth a controversial issue, but in a way that is free from the necessity of reaching a decision.

Travelling Friends: Also called Ministering Preachers or Visiting Preachers would hold gatherings where they would preach of their experience of the inward Christ.Travel(ing) Minute: The endorsement a Meeting gives to one of its members who is traveling under weight of a concern to other Meetings or to the wider world.

Truth: 1) Christ or the divine guide; 2) The Quaker ethical tradition.

Waiting upon God: Actively seeking and attending to God’s will in expectant silent worship.

Dictionary of Quaker Terms and Phrases (Part 2)

21 Jul By Dwight Leave a Comment

In this Part 2 of my Quaker Dictionary, I continue to present terms which are not necessarily self-explanatory. Together with Part 1 and the upcoming Part 3 should contribute to your understanding of Quaker records and the culture that produced them.

Labor with: An effort by one or more Friends to help another struggle with a concern or a difficulty and come through to a resolution.

Lay Over: To postpone a significant decision to allow time for further reflection and discussion.

Leadings: The sense of divine guidance or revelation.

Lift Up: To emphasize or make explicit a particular concern.

(To be) Made tender: Refers to the action of God that opens people up to the Truth.

Marrying Out: Marrying a non-Quaker.

Meeting: A term used in place of church.

Message: A spoken message or ministry by an individual inspired by Divine leading in a Meeting for Worship.

Mind(ing) the Light: An expression used to remind Friends that the Inward Light is in each person.

Ministers: Also known as ministering Friends, Public Friends and Recorded Ministers. These were men and women with the gift to speak and minister to others.

Ministry: When a person is inspired by the Spirit to speak in Meeting for Worship.

Monthly Meeting: The responsibility of the Monthly Meeting is to care for members, authorize removals and marriages, maintain discipline, consider queries and foster social concerns.

Moved: Led or prompted by the Spirit.

Notion: An approach to religiously important matters that is not based on first-hand spiritual experience.

Particular Meeting: A formally established Meeting for Worship under the care of a Monthly Meeting.

Passing Meeting: Acceptance by a Monthly Meeting of a written request.

Preparative Meeting: A small unorganized outlying Meeting for Worship.

Proceed as way opens: Taking one step at a time in a prayerful manner so as to become clear on what to do.

Queries: A set of questions, based upon Friends’ practices and testimonies. These are considered by Meetings and individuals as a way of guiding and examining individual and corporate lives and actions.

Dictionary of Quaker Terms and Phrases (Part 1)

20 Jul By Dwight Leave a Comment

The immigration of Irish Quakers (Society of Friends) to just about everywhere the Irish settled, means there are millions of us with Quaker ancestors. In our research we often are uncertain of what certain Quaker words and phrases mean in the records.

In this three part dictionary, I set forth some terms. I am drawing from books, online dictionaries, and have limited my list to terms which are not necessarily self-explanatory.

Acknowledgement: Apology by an offending member.

Advices: Ideals stated as a continuing reminder of the basic faith and principles.

Affirm(ation): A legal declaration as opposed to swearing an oath.

Birthright Member: The child of Quakers recorded at birth on the membership rolls.

Center(ing) Down: An endeavor to quite restless thoughts and open the heart in order to hear the Spirit speak directly.

Centered: The state of an individual or group in touch with the divine presence.

Children of Light: A name which early Quakers called themselves.

Christ Within: That of God in everybody. The Inward (Inner) Light.

Clearness: Confidence that an action is consistent with the divine will.

Concern: A spiritual principle or thought brought before a group of Meeting to be tested as truth.

Consistent Friend: Members who are particularly obedient to the outward testimonies.

Convinced Friend: A person who becomes a member of a Monthly Meeting.

Disorderly Walker: Members of a Meeting who are deemed to be acting contrary to the Truth and the Way.

Disownment/Disunity: Termination of membership.

Elder(ing): When used as a verb, “to elder” it is can be used to encourage a member. When used “been eldered” this is to bring into question an individual’s behavior.

Exercise: The exploration of a deep concern that has been brought to a Meeting.

Gathered (Covered) Meeting: A worshipping group when the presence of God is felt.

Hold in the Light: To ask for God’s presence to illumine a person, situation or problem.

In right ordering: Meaning in accordance with Friends practices.

Inward (Inner) Light: This Inner Light guides and directs each person bringing a unity with the Spirit of God. It is a direct, unmediated experience with the Divine.

CONTINUED TOMORROW

Vulgar Dictionaries

9 Jul By Dwight Leave a Comment

Whenever I come across an old word in a book or document and I don’t have a clue what it means, I refer to two old works online. The first is the Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue (1811) by Francis Grose (no joke). There are two main websites I consult: www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/5402 and www.fromoldbooks.org/Grose-VulgarTongue Another versions of it can be found on: http://vulgar.pangyre.org

This is a dictionary of British slang and words used among the common folk. For some of the definitions, Francis Grose seems to have drawn from the second work in this vulgar discussion; Nathan Bailey’s Dictionary of Theiving Slang (1736): http://words.fromoldbooks.org/NathanBailey-CantingDictionary or more appropriately “A Collection of the Canting Words and Terms, both ancient and modern, used by Beggars, Gypsies, Cheats, House-Breakers, Shop-Lifters, Foot-Pads, Highway-Men, &c.” By the way, Canting is defined in Bailey’s work as “the mysterious language of Rogues, Gypsies, Beggars, Thieves, &c.”

Here’s how I use these vulgar dictionaries. If you’re researching the colonial white indentured servant trade you will see the term “To Spirit Away.” That simply meant to kidnap. Now don’t confuse that with a “Spiritual Flesh Broker” who was a [church] parson. If you’re researching human relations, then a “Fancy Man” is “A man kept by a lady for secret services;” while a Whore-Monger is “A man that keeps more than one mistress…”

Amazingly, some of the terms you will read in these works are similar to ones still in use today. These reference works do not have all the terms you might come across. However, they have enough to keep you amused for hours. Whoever said history was boring!

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