Hysteria, Highstrikes, and Hysterics

This post originally appeared on the blog of my Victorian Dictionary Project, 16 October 2014.

Though hysteria has a two thousand-year history of using women’s bodies to opress them, the term was first adopted by medical circles in 1801, as an adaptation of the latin hysteric. The concept of hysteria and hysterics profoundly influenced the lives of women throughout the nineteenth century, regulating them to asylums, and providing a source of comedy, as evidenced through the colloquialism high strikes, or highstrikes, a comedic mispronunciation of hysterics that was popularized soon after hysteria made it into medical journals.

Many people prefer to attribute hysteria’s origins to Hippocrates, but the term doesn’t show up anywhere in the Hippocratic corpus. The Hippocratic corpus did lay the ground work for wandering womb theory, which became linked to the supposed symptoms of hysteria, the way that epileptic seizures were linked to an ability to communicate directly with God. Like belief in these conversations with God, wandering womb theory hung around in Europe for centuries.

Throughout the nineteenth century, hysteria was promoted as a medical condition caused by disturbances of the uterus (from the Greek ὑστέρα hystera “uterus”). Hysteria was often used to describe postpartum depression, but could be used to diagnose any characteristic people disliked about any particular woman. Historian, Laura Briggs, demonstrated how one Victorian physician compiled a seventy-five page list of possible symptoms of hysteria, and still called the list incomplete.

Because of hysteria’s use (and abuse) as a medical catchall, and an improved understanding of the body, hysteria is no longer a legitimate medical diagnosis. When we use the term today, we usually use it as part of the phrase mass hysteria to describe the way the people who watch Fox News react to things like ebola.

However, terms, like highstrikes, currently appear in the manuscript of the Dictionary of Victorian Insults & Niceties. The inclusion of such loaded terms fills me with a sense of responsibility to instruct my readers on the appropriate use of such terms, which is an exercise that no dictionary I’ve ever read has ever participated in.

As I edit, I find myself including notes that explain the connotations of such words, but I wonder if there are some words that shouldn’t be included at all.

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Bram Stoker's Rules for Cursing

I must tell you beforehand that Mr. Morris doesn’t always speak slang—that is to say, he never does so to strangers or before them, for he is really well educated and has exquisite manners—but he found out that it amused me to hear him talk American slang, and whenever I was present, and there was no one to be shocked, he said such funny things. I am afraid, my dear, he has to invent it all, for it fits exactly into whatever else he has to say. But this is a way slang has. I do not know myself if I shall ever speak slang; I do not know if Arthur likes it, as I have never heard him use any as yet. - Bram Stoker, Dracula

In that passage from Bram Stoker's Dracula, Lucy is writing to Mina. In it, she provides a wonderful peak into late-Victorian usage of colloquial language, from an upper-class woman's perspective. Her description reminds me of when I first had to describe to my daughter the appropriateness of swearing:

"Certain words have the power to hurt people, some of those words also seem to amuse other people, and some of them are appropriate to use some of the time, but you have to be careful when using them. Pay attention to who you are speaking with, and never say anything like that in front of grandma, a teacher, or someone younger than you."

That's why Mr. Morris never speaks slang to strangers. He knows Lucy finds it funny, so he does it to make her laugh. As of yet, Lucy is not sure she will ever find an appropriate situation to use slang.

As a guide to late-Victorian use of slang, this passage is informed by gender and class.

In Dracula, Stoker makes the old seaman speak in a phonetically-spelled Whitby accent, littered with colloquialisms.

“An’ when you said you’d report me for usin’ of obscene language that was ’ittin’ me over the ’ead; but the ’arf-quid made that all right. I weren’t a-goin’ to fight, so I waited for the food, and did with my ’owl as the wolves, and lions, and tigers does. But, Lor’ love yer ’art, now that the old ’ooman has stuck a chunk of her tea-cake in me, an’ rinsed me out with her bloomin’ old teapot, and I’ve lit hup, you may scratch my ears for all you’re worth, and won’t git even a growl out of me. Drive along with your questions. I know what yer a-comin’ at, that ’ere escaped wolf.” - Bram Stoker, Dracula

I've never enjoyed reading phonetically spelled dialects, but this passage adds to what Lucy has to say about colloquial language by offering a working-class male perspective. Even as a working-class man, he recognizes that some words are obscene, though he appears to have developed such a habit of using obscene words that he doesn't always remember to think about his audience when speaking.

Though this is just one late-Victorian writer's perspective on the use of Victorian language, it's something to consider when deciding whether a character you've set in the era would use the word 'fuck.'

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How to Curse Like a Gentleman: the F-Bomb!

The word "fuck" was first published in 1568. It seems counter to the ideal of Victorian culture, but the F-bomb shocked and titillated Victorians. It frequently appeared in Victorian pornographic writings, such as Philocomus’s Love Feast (1865)

That night I shall never forget; We fucked and fucked, and fucked and sweat.

And My Secret Life (1890).

I was dying with want of a fuck.

And elsewhere in the same text:

At daylight we were a hollow eyed, fucked out couple.

And:

The women had learnt a few English words explanatory of copulation—‘Me fuckee prick’ said one.

My Secret Life is the sexual memoir of a Victorian gentleman, called Walter. The first print only ran 25 copies. Subsequent copies were frequently suppressed, and subsequently pirated. Yet, the idea of "not giving a fuck" was Victorian, first appearing in print in George Augustus Henry Sala’s bawdy pantomime Harlequin Prince Cherrytop (1879).

For all your threats I don’t care a fuck. I’ll never leave my princely darling duck.

And fuck yourself appeared in New York in 1895.

By Senator Bradley: Q. Repeat what he said to you?
A. He said, ‘Go on, fuck yourself, you son-of-a-bitch; I will give you a hundred dollars’; he tried to punch me, and I went out.

The idea of being "fuckable" appeared in 1889.

The poor man had at last outwitted his careful wife and obtained a much longed for, fuckable cunt. - Charles Devereaux, “Venus in India” (1889).

Hugsome, carnally attractive, fuckable. - Farmer & Henley, “Slang III” (1893).

And in an 1862 letter from a soldier:

I together with several other officers went over to Petersburg, got drunk and f—ked out. We staid two days and nights, you ought to have seen me going to bed with a gal.

The English writer Edward Sellon has the honour of introducing the term “fuckee” to printed language in 1866.

For make fuckee business, sahib, that girl who is splashing the other one would be too much good.

But “fucker” goes back to 1598. Victorians were just having fun with it, introducing variations of the word “fuck,” such as “fuckhole” (1893), “fist-fuck” (1890), fucked (1863), and “motherfucking” (1889). Furthermore the fact that a word didn’t appear in print until 1893 doesn’t mean that it hadn’t been in use for twenty years or more.

Even I find it frustrating, as one who studies Victorian writers, that most of Victorian recorded language is preserved in the printed word. Their movies were silent, after all. The printed word differs from the spoken word greatly. Lots of great speakers don’t write well. Writing takes time and thought. It’s also subject to editing and we are all aware of the prim message that Victorian were trying to leave for posterity’s sake.

As a rule, a gentleman would never say “fuck” in front of a lady, but there were other kinds of women. I don’t think a Victorian should, or was even likely to use coarse language in front of their mothers, but when they were drunk, slumming, or one of those poor creatures who lived in the slums. In reality, Victorians probably swore about as much as we do, using many of the same terms.

“Shit” first appeared in print in 1325; “happy as a pig in shit” (1828); “the shit out of a” (1886); and “up shit’s creek” (1868). Certainly many Victorians saw the word “fuck” as classless and pornographic, but that really hasn’t changed.

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Top 30 Obsolete 1890s Words

Today, I'm writing a scene, in which one of my characters uses some harsh late-Victorian language. This, of course, lead me to the Oxford English Dictionary, where I was able to make and study a list of words that came into use during the 1890s, but have since become obsolete. Many of those words were related to science, so I did quite a bit of sorting before I developed a manageable list. From there, I was able to narrow it down to the top 30 words that capture the spirit of 1890s London.

1. crinanthropist n. a person who judges or criticizes other people. 
2. herohead, n. The quality or condition of being a hero or demigod. 
3. jobble, v. To move unevenly like a choppy sea. 
4. mancinism, n. The state or condition of having a bias in some way towards the left-hand side of the body. 
5. melomany, n. Enthusiasm or obsessive passion for music. 
6. mentism, n. Disruption of rational thought by overwhelming emotion or vivid imagination. 
7. mentulate, adj. Having a (large) penis. 
8. mogiphonia, n. Difficulty in producing loud vocal sounds, as in public speaking or singing, attributed to overuse of the voice. 
9. momiology, n. The scientific study of mummies. 
   
10. morningly, adj. Occurring every morning. 
11. morphiated, adj. Containing morphia; drugged with morphia. 
12. moting, n. v. Mechanical, self-propelled movement of a vehicle. 
13. muckerdom, n. Townspeople, as opposed to college students; the world of such people. 
14. mythometer, n. A supposed system or standard for judging myths. 
15. nanity, n. The condition of being abnormally deficient or underdeveloped in a particular characteristic. 
16. ne’er-do-wellish, n. The worthless, disreputable people as a class. 
17. neighbourize, v. To associate with others as neighbours; to act in a neighbourly fashion. 
18. omnivorosity, n. A kind of enthusiastic wide-eyed curiousity; a combination of omnivorous and voracious.. eg.: "With the omnivorosity of youth I eagerly devoured them."
19. opiism, n. The intoxicated state induced by taking opium; the habit of taking opium for the purpose of intoxication. 
20. origines, n. The original facts or documents on which a historical or other work is based. 
21. pekoe, v. To blend with pekoe tea. 
    
22. pennoncier, n. A knight bachelor. 
23. philobiblical, adj. Devoted to literature. 
24. philo-sophistry, n. Love of or inclination towards sophistry. 
25. pigfully, adv. In a manner befitting a pig. 
26. plutogogy, n. Rule by the wealthy and their apologists. 
27. poplocracy, n. Popular rule; government by the people. 
28. proverbiologist, n. A person who studies proverbs. 
29. pseudo-archaist, n. A person who invents or uses artificial archaisms, esp. in language. 
30. repressful, adj. Apt to repress something; repressive.

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Dirty Words

I'm sure all my readers know the stereotype about how tragic it could be to offend a Victorian's sensibilities, but that they were a lot dirtier than we give them credit for. Yet, when writing historical fiction, which I'm doing, I search and search for the language to describe the things they were obsessed with, but ought not discuss.

It turns out there's an awful lot of language they used, so I'm compiling here a glossary or thesaurus of Victorian dirty words - strictly for use in literary endeavours!

Lady parts: cock alley, cock lane, crinkum-crankum, cunny, dumb glutton, grinder, fruitful vine, madge, Miss or Lady Laycock, money ('Careful or you'll show us your money'), muff, notch, old hat (it was felt after all), one's commodity, quim.

Gentleman parts: arbor vitae, cock, cock stand, cods, dildo, doodle, gaying instrument, john, johnson, john thomas, lobcock, Nebuchadnezzar, pego, plug-tail, samson, tackle, tickle tail, whore-pipe, willy.

Some other fun words were: gamahuching or minetting (oral sex), lickerish (aroused), and a swill tub (a drunk).

Magda Knight provides a pretty extensive glossary of other terms too, which you can find here. Also, check out my post on cucumber sandwiches!

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