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sayings

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Hi viv;
here are afew more words of brummie lingo ;

saft ;- a daft person,as in ; don,t be daft ;
gawping ;- the brummie way of starining open mouth ;
gazunder ; - a chamber pot usally used at night to save you going out side loo. It was stored under, ; the bed; goes under ;
and pulled out at the appropiate time [ hopefully ]
pitherin; - some one who is doing things that are aimless, or filling time.
Flummuxed -- confused .
Fl;ea- pitt old time cinema with bugs who got in with out paying ;.
Balmpot---someone whose is abit daft .
Necks wik - seven days time
narner -- some one who has done some think silly .
Steelie -- a kind of marble, often a ball - bearing. Not to be confused with a glarnie or a gobbie.
Traispin; being dragged around the shops when you really want to .
Tarrarabit -- good bye. Astonian;;
 
I think Nan would be pleased she was quoted on here. I have swamped many BHF postings with her sayings since my time on here. I would have to use PM's for some of them though they would offend everybody.
Your Balmpot she would say Barn pot maybe that's being Black Country and not from Burnymung (Brum) to quote her.
Most of yours she used. Some of her dialect sounded almost northern like Fairther for her father and dinna fret thee sen = don't worry. Though she reckoned people from Stourbridge were less broad than say those from Gornal or Dudley.
If I think of any more that she said I will have to write them down and put them on.
I recall her saying a funny person or a comedian was...a caution. And pen and ink for stink, cockney rhyming slang maybe. If your long trowsiz (trousers) were a bit short she would call them half mast. Half cut for drunk and half soaked for someone not all there.
My Dad from Cov said you over ripe narner. Her marbles were marlies.
As black as club ten.
I ay as green as arm cabbage lookin. etc etc
 
I think Balmpot is a Yorkshire expression also, and flummoxed I have seen used in the south
 
Just found this thread and had great fun reading it - some I hadn't heard before but 'kench' in our house related to that funny pain you got in your neck/shoulder if you turned round awkwardly and it took some minutes to go.

When Mom was late she would say 'all behind like a cow's tail' but the chap at work says 'half-past ten and not a babby in the 'ouse bathed yet'.
 
If something was crooked (Lady Penelope's shoulder pain brought it to mind) say if Nan's jumper was not on straight should would say I am all skew- whiff and a hacking cough was an' ackin' cow. When mum was late she would say, it's like getting a trip train out of London.
 
I just used one of my Nan's syings today. I was relating an event about a wiered ex colleague who was dismissed on the spot for having a bag of knives and was brndishing them in an aggressive manner. They rounded up the 2 security men and the commissionaire who were all timid and I said, " They couldn't knock the skin off a rice pudding." She also said "they couldn't punch an 'ole in a wet paper bag'' usually about my dad though.
 
My mom used to say, Don't play in the horse road, Go and jump in the cut, I,ll give your legs a a wailing,Silly daft sod,Saft in the Meet yourself coming back,Dont play in the entry and loads of other dittys, bless her.
 
As a boy in 1950s Sparkbrook, I was often told by my mother never to suck pennies and other coins. "You'll get the cankers (or was it kankers?) she used to warn. I never did find out exactly what "the cankers" was, but it sounded awful enough to put me off sucking coinage!

Regards, Ray T.
 
Ray, I remember my mom telling me not to put coins in my mouth as 'men might have been to the toilet you know' (!!) I think 'cankers' was probably mouth cancer so good advice.
If Mom wasn't quite dressed ready to go out and someone came to the door she was always 'in her disabelle'. Also remember fizzog for face, have we had that yet? I think they're both from French words.
 
I had a great, great uncle just after the war whose sayings came down in the family. His poor wife always had a hard time getting him out of bed and off to the factory in the mornings, and she used to shout upstairs: "Jack, I don't know how you can sleep with all the money you owe!" And from behind the bedroom door came the reply: "I don't know how them poor devils can sleep as I owe it to!"
 
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Shakespeare used the word 'cankers' in one of the Henry's according to Carl Chinn and we all know Shakespeare spoke like us so it's been around for quite some time.
 
Lady Penelope said:
Shakespeare used the word 'cankers' in one of the Henry's according to Carl Chinn and we all know Shakespeare spoke like us so it's been around for quite some time.
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This made me smile Lady P! Living in Australia and having a Midlands Accent (Coventry) I've often said that Shakespeare talked like me, I get funny looks from some! ;)
 
My mother often recounted the story of how one day a gypsy woman knocked at the door of a female relative -- I think it was mother's aunt. The gypsy was selling clothes pegs but perhaps had a sideline in fortune telling, because she told her potential customer: "You've got a lucky face, my dear." To which the woman in the doorway responded: "Aar, and a lucky breezer!", and promptly closed the door. "Breezer" here was used by a Brummie as a word for "behind" with obvious connotations with wind, though I've never heard of it outside this story.

Regards, Ray T.
 
Hi Barbinoz, I think people only hear Shakespeare spoken by the posh lot so think that he must've talked like that too. I honestly don't think anyone did in those days especially in a country town like S-o-A. It's a bit like folks thinking that a Midlands accent means you're thick. Well Will wasn't was he?!
 
If I asked for something my Nan would say "Them that asks don't get and them that don't ask don't want!"
"A whistling woman and a crowing hen is neither good for God nor men"
 
Lady Penelope said:
Shakespeare used the word 'cankers' in one of the Henry's according to Carl Chinn and we all know Shakespeare spoke like us so it's been around for quite some time.
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That Carl Chinn knows his stuff, but he missed out Bill's other dozen or so references to canker. Bill used it mostly in the sense of the briar or dog rose.

Who said Brummies were thick?
 
My mother used to say that somebody was "for the 'igh jump", meaning they'd been caught doing wrong and were going to be punished. I guess the "high jump" referred to was associated with hanging. And if something was broken my mother used to say it had "gone west". This is interesting because it seems to have connection with the ancient Egyptian belief that the west was where people's spirits went after death, that being the region of the setting sun, symbolically dying every day. That's why Egyptian pyramids and tombs were traditionally placed on the west side of the Nile. So far as I know, this idea wasn't indigenous to Britain. And while I can't say the Egyptians brought it to the Midlands themselves, I wonder if Bronze Age traders carried the idea from the Mediterranean along with their pots and necklaces a few thousand years ago.

Regards, Ray T
 
Pedrocut - Off topic a bit but I have lost count of the times I've seen a Brummie portrayed on the television (usually with the wrong accent) and they're always a bit dim. I can't believe that any of the writers have ever met one of us. I think we have a special accent which is very hard to copy unless you have lived here. My brother lives in London and comes to stay several times a year, he soon lapses into 'proper-speak' and his wife always makes disparaging remarks.

Back on topic, I remember that if I kept asking Dad for something he'd say 'hello give me, goodbye send me'. Is that a Birmingham saying do you know anyone?
 
Lady P, we're certainly not thick! Here's what researchers reckon the original productions of Shakespeare would have sounded like:
To me it sounds like a West Country accent, I found I liked it better than the plays I saw in Stratford in the late 60s! Who really knows, I'll just stick to my guns and say Bill sounded like a Coventry kid! Have a good day folks!
 
I think coming from Smethwick I learnt a mix of Brummie and Black Country sayings, though a lot of the ones mentioned my nan and granddad used, my granddad was originally from Winson Green though.

I was called Fanny Finackerpants and Fanny Anne, told to stop being mardy (a word I still use), if the wind changes you'll be in trouble, my nan was caggy handed ( left handed) and because I am able to throw a ball, dart or football trophy better with my left hand, just ask my ex!! my granddad would call me half caggy handed, nan would say it was mizzling if it was drizzling, I still use that one as well.

You had a piece when you came home from school before teatime, went up the wooden hills to Bedfordshire, had a cat lick and a promise for a quick wash, dad would have a swill when he came home from work, mom would say it's looking black over the back of Bill's mother's if it looked like rain.

I used to sprain my ankle a lot as a child and more often than not it was bad enough for a crepe bandage, my granddad would say you've kenched your ankle again when he saw me.

I've been reading this thread and smiling and saying oh yes I remember either granddad, nan, mom or dad saying that, it's a shame the words are largely dying out now, at 50 I'm probably part of the youngest generation to remember them, also it's a shame our accent is dying out, and I hate to hear actors and actresses try and do it, for me the best one would be Richard Beckinsdale in Porridge, I always felt he had a convincing accent AND he used to mention Smethwick!
 
My mother was born in Grove Lane Smethwick, just "over the border", but she always thought of herself as Brummy, and proud of Birmingham.
I always wondered where the back of Bill's mother was as I had three uncles called Bill!!
I wonder who Fanny Fanackerpants was?! I was often called that!
rosie.
 
When I asked my mother where she'd been, she would often reply "there and back to see how far it is"
 
Jayell said:
When I asked my mother where she'd been, she would often reply "there and back to see how far it is"
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l was used to all those sayings as my g/mother came from Walsall....but the one saying my mother used was.... l've got a bone to pick with you....then l knew I was in trouble, Brenda
 
My Dad would say, " That was a brarmer (sp) meaning something special like a spectacular goal, & for some reason my Mother often used to say " Sally Anne Teacake". If someone was looking glum, they had a face "As long as Livery Street " & found it before it was lost!
 
Brummygirl66 said:
I think coming from Smethwick I learnt a mix of Brummie and Black Country sayings, though a lot of the ones mentioned my nan and granddad used, my granddad was originally from Winson Green though.

I was called Fanny Finackerpants and Fanny Anne, told to stop being mardy (a word I still use), if the wind changes you'll be in trouble, my nan was caggy handed ( left handed) and because I am able to throw a ball, dart or football trophy better with my left hand, just ask my ex!! my granddad would call me half caggy handed, nan would say it was mizzling if it was drizzling, I still use that one as well.

You had a piece when you came home from school before teatime, went up the wooden hills to Bedfordshire, had a cat lick and a promise for a quick wash, dad would have a swill when he came home from work, mom would say it's looking black over the back of Bill's mother's if it looked like rain.

I used to sprain my ankle a lot as a child and more often than not it was bad enough for a crepe bandage, my granddad would say you've kenched your ankle again when he saw me.

I've been reading this thread and smiling and saying oh yes I remember either granddad, nan, mom or dad saying that, it's a shame the words are largely dying out now, at 50 I'm probably part of the youngest generation to remember them, also it's a shame our accent is dying out, and I hate to hear actors and actresses try and do it, for me the best one would be Richard Beckinsdale in Porridge, I always felt he had a convincing accent AND he used to mention Smethwick!
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Hi I lived in Hay Mills till I was 13 and all the sayings you have mentioned we used in the 40s and 50s so I would say they are general to Brum. I live in a small village near Tamworth now and the other day I was in the club having a laugh with the bar maid, when I happened to say that I was short of ackers to my surprise she and the others at the bar had never heard the saying before.
 
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