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What are your favorite old-timey and historical insults and incredulous expressions? (lemmy.sdf.org)

submitted 2 months ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]

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[–] [email protected] 35 points 2 months ago

"I'd challenge you to a battle of wits, but I see you're unarmed."

~ William Shakespeare, The Taming of the Shrew

"You want my children? Take them! I have the instrument to make more."

~ Caterina Sforza when blackmailed by kidnappers using her children as leverage (main source: Niccolo Machiavelli)

"We fulfill the demands of nature in a much better way than do you Roman women; for we consort openly with the best men, whereas you let yourselves be debauched in secret by the vilest."

~ Earliest recorded words of a Scot, third century AD (never change, Scotland).

[–] [email protected] 29 points 2 months ago (3 children)

When my late husband said, "why you syphilitic son of a bitch" I knew that he was really angry at someone and if he said "rats in a dishpan" then something just went haywire. He passed away 30 years ago now and I have never heard another person say those things.

[–] [email protected] 11 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago) (3 children)

...I have never heard another person say those things.

Haha, I can totally relate to someone making up expressions, then sticking with them. For example, a couple I made up for whatever reason, and still employ with a frequency:

Oh, rabbits! (expression of surprise, sometimes used as a mild curse)
Well, shut my mouth and spank my bottom! (surprised, Southern-style)
Smooch my ruby, red rump! (tauntingly, Bender of Futurama-style)

EDIT: Oh, and my grandpère used to loudly exclaim "Fiddlesticks!" when he was obviously angry or deeply annoyed. I've never heard that term used ever across old literature, films, etc.

EDIT2: Back when the TV series Deadwood was running, I remember someone online asking 'why are they swearing using completely modern terms?' and someone else answering 'because if the show used authentic curse words, the characters would all sound like variants of Yosemite Sam.'

I dunno, speaking as a Naked Gun / Zucker fan, I think I might have enjoyed that! :P

[–] [email protected] 11 points 2 months ago

Fiddlesticks is a known English term. It's a mild oath like dang or darn.

[–] [email protected] 7 points 2 months ago (2 children)

"Oh rabbits" sounds like something Wallace and Gromit would say.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 2 months ago (1 children)

"Oh, Rabbits!" is actually an Australian curse much like Americans say, Oh, Rats. It comes from the Great Rabbit plague. Never heard of it?

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rabbit_plagues_in_Australia

[–] [email protected] 5 points 2 months ago

I've heard of the rabbit plague but never would've made that connection.

Always found it akin to the perfect example of Murphy's Law that humans are the one invasive species that doesn't thrive well there.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 2 months ago

Reminds me of Butters from South Park, he says "Oh hamburgers!"

[–] [email protected] 6 points 2 months ago

My dad once described a tree as being "deader than a snake" and i can't help but wonder how much deader than a snake that tree actually was... 3/5? A half gallon? 28 minutes?

[–] [email protected] 5 points 2 months ago (1 children)

I love it. I've been enjoying "MotherFather" as a soft landing out of habitually cursing when frustrated.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 2 months ago

i think Steve Martin said MotherFather Chinese Dentist

[–] [email protected] 2 points 2 months ago

My sister once told someone to eat a steaming bowl of rat assholes, and our friend group used that one for years.

[–] [email protected] 20 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago) (2 children)

You can get pretty good results by saying, "Well {verb} my {noun}!" It always ends up sounding quaint. It's like the mad libs of incredulity

Well kiss my grits!
Well steam my hogs!
Well string my banjo!
Well iron my shirts!
Well paint my deck!
Well trash my patio!
Well crash my harddrive!
Well tear my pants!

[–] [email protected] 4 points 2 months ago

You get this for "well trash my patio".

[–] [email protected] 3 points 2 months ago

These sound extremely historical lol

[–] [email protected] 9 points 2 months ago (4 children)

I say "Jesus, Mary, and Joseph" as an exclamation to this day.

[–] [email protected] 7 points 2 months ago

That reminds me, I once heard an irritated dad at a kids playground yell "cheese and rice"!

[–] [email protected] 4 points 2 months ago

I've started saying "Oh Buddah" just to mix it up a bit

[–] [email protected] 3 points 2 months ago

Same.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 2 months ago

I have a Day of the Dead (1985) drinking game that includes taking a drink whenever the alcoholic says, "Jesus, Mary, and Joseph." It's the only real catch-phrase in the movie, and since he's usually taking a drink too I don't feel like I'm drinking alone.

[–] [email protected] 8 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago)

"Ketter" meaning heathen.

My grandfather used it recently: "I used to smoke like a heathen".

[–] [email protected] 6 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago) (1 children)

Accusing someone of having too much semen.

It was a thing.

John Adams accused Alexander Hamilton of having such an excess of semen that all the brothels in the city couldn't help him.

[–] [email protected] 0 points 2 months ago (1 children)

You got too many swimmers bro, I can't even

[–] [email protected] 0 points 2 months ago (1 children)

It was an insult, too. Different times.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 2 months ago

If someone said that to me I'd interpret that as having too much unprotected sex, so basically being a slut

[–] ininewcrow 5 points 2 months ago

A she bitch of a goat's gizzard

[–] [email protected] 4 points 2 months ago (1 children)

Scotland was, oddly, the last country in the UK do get rid of blasphemy laws, so the generation before mine used phrases like -

Jings, crivvens and help ma Boab!

And

In the name o the wee man!

[–] [email protected] 1 points 2 months ago

Never knew that jings crivvens was a placeholder for anything. I'm guessing ”Jesus, Christ and help me God"? TIL!

[–] [email protected] 4 points 2 months ago (1 children)

Always like to hear a "dagnamit" or a "goldarnit".

[–] [email protected] 2 points 2 months ago

Cansarnit!

[–] [email protected] 4 points 2 months ago

"I'll be hornswaggled in duck sauce!"

I'm also partial to "you are mercifully free of the ravages of intelligence" from the movie Time Bandits, and i use it frequently. Applied it to a comment yesterday, as a matter of fact.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 2 months ago

Consarn it, rabble rousers and highwaymen struck when the iron was hot and now the flat foots are taking them all to the hoose-gow.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 2 months ago

Cor blimey

[–] [email protected] 1 points 2 months ago

My username.

[–] [email protected] 0 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago)

Not an insult really, but always like the saying

"it's louder than 2 skeletons fucking on a tin roof"

Points if it comes from unexpected sources.