• Welcome to this forum . We are a worldwide group with a common interest in Birmingham and its history. While here, please follow a few simple rules. We ask that you respect other members, thank those who have helped you and please keep your contributions on-topic with the thread.

    We do hope you enjoy your visit. BHF Admin Team

Brummie sayings & language

Status
Not open for further replies.
On bath night (once a week) my dad would look at me standing waiting to get in to the tin fireside tub, chickle and say, Blue Moon.
Nan would say of me "yow think the moon was made of grayne chayse," as I was naive.
If I had a snotty nose mum would pretend to wipe her finger down the front of her blouse saying "see them straaaps (stripes) dewn my shirt"
Never on a month of Sundays.
On a Toosdy Maryanne, was that a common saying or just nan I wonder?
Monday was washing day, cold mate left oova from Sunday or chayse n mint sauce if we ay got none.
Tuesday ironing.Often faggots or stuffed marra.
Wednesday bedrooms
Thursday Downstairs
Friday shopping day. Summat and chips from the chippy for me as a treat from mum.
Gtandad called school skee oo wel.(said fast)
 
Hi guys ;
i do not know whether or not this was as been said before on here
but when one is ranting and raving to another person in an argument a person would say to them to try and agitate them and call
the other person yampy you want to be sent to the mad house cos your yampy ; go away ;
get the men in the white coates and take him or her away ; i used to hear his word quite often when i was growing up in my
whipper snapper days ;
 
Hello Young Fella, I was once in Aston Park with my older brother having a bit of a gang fight when he ordered me to go home in case I got hurt. I picked up a stone and threw it at him and unfortunately it hit him in the earhole. I can still hear him shouting after seventy years, 'You Yampy little whatsit, who's side are you on anyway.' Still laughing and will remind him on Sunday when I telephone him. Thanks and kind regards. David.
 
this has just come to mind what my dad used to say...if anyone was real sick dad would always say looks like its curtains for him, and low and behold a few days later the curtains would be drawn....was that a brummy saying ....l know when my g/parents died within 10days of each other l did.nt think the front room would ever see the light of day...do people still do that in respect for the dead....Brenda
 
hi david
nice to hear from you again after all this time i hope you are well just read your reply on the forum i hope you was not the kids my oldest sister used to shout at when she was trying to get the whiches hat bouncing around up and as high she wanted to go ;she was a proper bully when she was a kid
some little kids would be screaming i want to get off those bigger lads got a bit of a slatenig from her i was only little at the time
i spent hours down the aston park every evening after coming out of school with my little friends
i had to smile at your reply in what you said about your brother and called him yampie and threw a brick at him ;
i think it was the normal as kids in hose day ; a mate ; good opld days and got chase by old horriss the old park keeper on his hercules bike
and ex police officiers bikes made at aston cross with the old dynomo on the back wheel for his light he was a tall chap with specs but by golly could he pedal
around the bowling green and more so around peter pan ;our little tickers used to pump like mad as you may know he was an ex jailoer at digbeth police station
from young to retireing when he joined the parks department he later went to the edbaston resovoir to patrol
many thanks for the birthday wishes best wishes to you and your good lady
brenda; yes it was the sign and the normal for our seniors in life of yester years that when a family member died the people closed there curtains for at least a
week or two as a kid we was told that it was the sign ;i have great respect for my olders and there traditions personaly my self
i do beleive that the older generation still do this practice but today the marjority of the younger generation do not do this in my opiniuon
which is sad i think , when we was kids playing in the street and more so up the cromwel terrace which had twenty house up and shared four toilets up the yard between the twenty familys we got to se thishappened quite often as they was all older generations so as we seen this one of us would say to each other as kids mrs so and so curtains are drawn so some one in there is dead and after a week we would see the under takers coming out
best wishes to you and all members Astonian;; Alan;
 
denniss ;
you could have said one or the other ;
dressed to kill; or dressed up like kippers and curtains
dressed up like a dog s dinner all dressed up and no where to go
or you look like a manikin wuffda
best wishes Astonian;;
 
Astonian said:
denniss ;
you could have said one or the other ;
dressed to kill; or dressed up like kippers and curtains
dressed up like a dog s dinner all dressed up and no where to go
or you look like a manikin wuffda
best wishes Astonian;;
Click to expand...

Tee hee alan mate.....about you she'd have probably said "ee's been a lttle bugger up the back all morning"....and she'd have no CLUE as to what it might mean today...
 
Last edited:
Are we now in an era were most of the posted sayings and langage are becoming lost on our present young people? They nearly all have their own "Chav" language which I can't keep up with! When I use some of those delightful old sayings, here posted, I get a teenage look of complete disbelief and "what are you on about now" . To me the use of phone text is out-doing, maybe, the country's sayings and we will reach a stage, possibly due to TV, were it is common place to drop the "T" and "G". How many of us have grandchildren who we try to tell that water, better, going etc are not "worah" ,"beah"," goin" ( however they are spelt). I suppose this is how our sayings and language were received by our earlier generations. So now it is time for me to become bewidered by the "Chav". I must add , on the quiet, that I am fascinated by it all, so good luck!!!!!!!!!!
 
hi den;
she would say where are you going then; to meet woman at the back of rachams ?, i would reply ; no i am going to the back of the co/op
Its double divi ; today ; Astonian;;
 
Astonian said:
hi den;
she would say where are you going then; to meet woman at the back of rachams ?, i would reply ; no i am going to the back of the co/op
Its double divi ; today ; Astonian;;
Click to expand...

..ans did you give em your co-op number or green shield stamps?...always one for a bargain you...in yer Daily Mail boots and yer ganzey...
 
YES dennis
My little black book pass book was always topped up
my number was 23 27 60 if you used the green sheilds stamp the only got the rough products at the co/op it was an high class property
in fact of speaking of the co/op i have in my garage a co/op dressing table
with there name in it in the draws it goes its stands its pace
but green sheilds was complete rubbish and to many to collect before you got the goods astonian
 
Nan would say crairky gairt (crakey gate) ongs well, hangs well. Reffering to her own ache and pains. She died when she was 93.
and Hard winter, full churchyard,
ee looks like death warmed up!
All dolled up.
A nancy boy.
A wiljew
A flyblow.
Ar look lark ov bin pilled through an 'edge backuds.
Flummoxed.
Lord help a sailor on a night like this.
Arm Fit ta bost. It's bin bosted.
We used to say meet you at the back of Woollies in yer sling back wellies.
A horseshoe of ham.
 
brenda barr said:
this has just come to mind what my dad used to say...if anyone was real sick dad would always say looks like its curtains for him, and low and behold a few days later the curtains would be drawn....was that a brummy saying ....l know when my g/parents died within 10days of each other l did.nt think the front room would ever see the light of day...do people still do that in respect for the dead....Brenda
Click to expand...
Everyone in the street drew their curtains in respect when someone died. Then young newcomers would not do it. Now no one does.
At my step childrens' grandma's funeral they were surprised when I mentioned drawing her house curtains. They were also at sixes and sevens as they had not planned for the funeral cortege to leave from their gran's house, as she died in a care home. And that they were expected to travel in the funeral car, and no I chuckled they couldn't sit in the hearse, I explained that is what people do at a funeral. They are late in their 30's and I thought they would have known.
I just attednded a funeral and everone was seated inside and I was standing like a lemoin outside. But at all my family funerals and others everyone waited for the family to come in first and the mourners wait outside. What say you Brummies?
 
Astonian said:
Hello young fella, love your work, Winds blowing a gale today, enough to blow the Joeys out of the kangaroo pouches. Greiving in Aston when we were kids was much longer as I remember it. The real oldies, like us now, would keep the curtains closed for a full year or is my imagination playing tricks on me. Kind regards Alan and keep up the good work, love it. David
Click to expand...
 
We kept our curtain closed till after the funeral, my grandparents would close theirs for the day. Have seen them closed at an Irish wake for a week. My One gran used to lay people out for her street, she put pennies on their eyelids. She cleaned at the city mortuary during the COv blitz. She says they used to bind the bodies with bandages to expel the air. The bodies were all together and she noted they mostly had their false teeth removed and she would sing and talk to them as she cleaned. One body had not been done properly and expelled air and moved and moaned, she inadvertantly put her foot in the mop bucket and ran out with it. I can imagine her as she was a big woman! She used to makes us laugh with that one. I know if a crow sat on the roof it was to fortell a death. A neighbour (from Alderney) always said that. When someone died, "their was a crow on their roof all day!"
 
Dennis Williams said:
Tee hee alan mate.....about you she'd have probably said "ee's been a lttle bugger up the back all morning"....and she'd have no CLUE as to what it might mean today...
Click to expand...

Hi Dennis, I've only ever heard my Dad say that, I thought it was one he'd made up! I think it must have had a more innocent meaning in those days ( 50 odd years ago) as the worst my Dad ever said was "bloody"!
He also used to call Brum the "Holy City - more Holey than righteous" in reference to all the man-hole covers in the streets!
 
Barbinoz said:
Hi Dennis, I've only ever heard my Dad say that, I thought it was one he'd made up! I think it must have had a more innocent meaning in those days ( 50 odd years ago) as the worst my Dad ever said was "bloody"!
He also used to call Brum the "Holy City - more Holey than righteous" in reference to all the man-hole covers in the streets!
Click to expand...

You betcha Barbi...my nan was born 1896...lived to 102....had five kids, three still going...and she NEVER could say the word sex...she called it sek...and on her 100th, she pulled my 20 year old daughter over to her, and asked if she'd got a boyfriend. Yes Nan says Nic. Well don't tell you mother, but you needn't get pregnant nowadays - you can get tablets for it she whispered...

i wept....
 
Wow What a woman, 102, that's a marvellous innings! My Dad - if he'd have lived would have been 100 this May last. So he's have been the generation after you Nan. Great memories xx
 
Dennis Williams said:
You betcha Barbi...my nan was born 1896...lived to 102....had five kids, three still going...and she NEVER could say the word sex...she called it sek...and on her 100th, she pulled my 20 year old daughter over to her, and asked if she'd got a boyfriend. Yes Nan says Nic. Well don't tell you mother, but you needn't get pregnant nowadays - you can get tablets for it she whispered...

i wept....
Click to expand...
My bosses mother in law said sec as well. My mates gran said all you here on he telly is buck buck buck.His other gran told my then girlfriend you keep yer hand on yer hapenny love. Went down like a ton of bricks. Mum's old friend would say about the TV, you can't turn it on but what they're in the xxxx bed again. Whenever Bernard Mathews Turkeys (Bootiful) came on she would cry ya dirty old xxxxxxxr. And Des O'Connor etc.
 
Bill123 said:
My great-grand mother would have been 162 on Saturday.....If she'd lived!!
Click to expand...
My dad always said that about his mum. I say it to annoy my partner now. Gran would be 123 now. Nan would be 106, great gran 140 and my great great aunt my favourite one, 135. My grandads all died young. 61, 75 and 51.
 
Just watched Question Time, Nan's saying kept leaping in to my mind, like, worra load a tripe! and I wouldn't trust em as far as I could throw em, and I wouldn't trust em that much, she would pinch her index finger against her thumb and leave a hair's breadth at the end. Whem parliament was filmed she would say a load of ruddy sheep.
 
Barbinoz said:
Hi Dennis, I've only ever heard my Dad say that, I thought it was one he'd made up! I think it must have had a more innocent meaning in those days ( 50 odd years ago) as the worst my Dad ever said was "bloody"!
He also used to call Brum the "Holy City - more Holey than righteous" in reference to all the man-hole covers in the streets!
Click to expand...

My Dad's language never got worse than "bleedin'" in front of us kids. I was told by my mate though that he swore as much as his mates did, when they were out fishing.
 
Mum said, ladies don't swear, dad said she's no lady she'e my wife, and duck.
Nan would say good gom, her mother would say she was taking the Lord's name in vain. When Gt Gran died Nan started saying good god!
 
One time, when I was on leave, aged about 18, I accidentally slipped in a word that has always been in common use by the rough soldiery, while talking to Our Mom. The look she gave me made me want to curl up and hide. Now I find her laughing her head off at Chubby brown, Mrs Brown's Boys and avidly reading those "Shades of Grey" books !
 
Yes Baz. (How young is your dear mom anyway?) I think our parents and grandparents change with the times. Nan re-married and came out with some language that she would have previously called vulgar and would have told my grandad off for saying. When I took her to task she replied that all the women 'up north' (her new Scunthorpe inlaws) swore like that in regular conversation. I reminded her that they also sat at home drinking tea while there menfolk went to their men only WMC's.
She spent a lot of time in hospital in her final years and took great delight in churning out intricate details of her intimate anatomy which would have shocked her years ago. When she used to say "they had it all taken away, and the back passage and what she'd got and I hadnt'."The nearest she got to that was her sweet Fanny Adams. Nico
 
My Mom is 96, Nico, 97 next January. She still doesn't swear, in fact as a kid I remember her saying "blue pencil" this or "blue pencil" that, (a hangover from the days of wartime censorship, I think), that was as profane as she ever got.
 
I never heard that before Baz. Can you explain it to me? I was born towards the end of sweet rationing.
You are a lucky man too Baz to have your mom that long. Lots of people of your mom's era didn't swear I find, or drink or smoke heavily. I know lots did but there is too much of it from the likes of a certain TV chef. Where it is ,or was illegal to swear in the workplace. Now the F word is used as an adjective.
I used to have a gay boss who was gay before the word was invented. He hated swearing and bad language. He was funny though. He would get as bad "well damn me!" And would often say, "ooh she is common," of some of the staff. I don't know what he would say now!
 
As far as I know, during wartime there was a lot of censorship inflicted on our population and in the case of the written word, the censor used a blue pencil to cross out the offending bits. It seems that if people wanted to use bad language but couldn't, people used the expression "blue pencil".
When I first joined the army, a Cannock bloke I knew used to say "blood and sand !"
 
Status
Not open for further replies.
Back
Top