The Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue dates from 1811 and this is probably the only full, uncensored and searchable version of this dictionary on the internet. All the original crudities have been restored and it offers an interesting perspective on Common English from the time of the Regency and Jane Austen.

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Entries releated to ARK

 

ARK		A boat or wherry. Let us take an ark and winns, let us take a sculler.
ARK RUFFIANS		Rogues who, in conjunction with watermen, robbed, and sometimes murdered, on the water, by picking a quarrel with the passengers in a boat, boarding it, plundering, stripping, and throwing them overboard, etc. A species of badger.
BARKER		The shopman of a bow-wow shop, or dealer in second hand clothes, particularly about Monmouth-Street, who walks before his master's door, and deafens every passenger with his cries of - Clothes, coats, or gowns - what d'ye want, gemmen? - what d'ye buy? See BOW-WOW SHOP.
BARKING IRONS		Pistols, from their explosion resembling the bow-wow or barking of a dog. IRISH.
BARKSHIRE		A member or candidate for Barkshire, said of one troubled with a cough, vulgarly styled barking.
BENE DARKMANS		Goodnight.
BERMUDAS		A cant name for certain places in London, privileged against arrests, like the Mint in Southwark, Ben. Jonson. These privileges are abolished.
BESS, or BETTY		A small instrument used by house-breakers to force open doors. Bring bess and glym; bring the instrument to force the door, and the dark lantern. Small flasks, like those for Florence wine, are also called betties.
BILLINGSGATE LANGUAGE		Foul language, or abuse. Billingsgate is the market where the fishwomen assemble to purchase fish; and where, in their dealings and disputes, they are somewhat apt to leave decency and good manners a little on the left hand.
BING		To go. Bing avast; get you gone. Binged avast in a darkmans; stole away in the night. Bing we to Rumeville: shall we go to London?
BIRTH-DAY SUIT		He was in his birth-day suit, that is, stark naked.
BISHOPED, or TO BISHOP		A term used among horse-dealers, for burning the mark into a horse's tooth, after he has lost it by age; by bishoping, a horse is made to appear younger than he is. It is a common saying of milk that is burnt too, that the bishop has set his foot in it. Formerly, when a bishop passed through a village, all the inhabitants ran out of their houses to solicit his blessing, even leaving their milk, etc. on the fire, to take its chance: which, went burnt to, was said to be bishoped.
BLACK GUARD		A shabby, mean fellow; a term said to be derived from a number of dirty, tattered roguish boys, who attended at the Horse Guards, and Parade in St. James's Park, to black the boots and shoes of the soldiers, or to do any other dirty offices. These, from their constant attendance about the time of guard mounting, were nick-named the black-guards.
BLINDMAN'S HOLIDAY		Night, darkness.
BORN UNDER A THREEPENNY HALFPENNY PLANET		... never to be worth a groat. Said of any person remarkably unsuccessful in his attempts or profession.
BOW-WOW SHOP		A salesman's shop in Monmouth-street; so called because the servant barks, and the master bites. See BARKER.
BUDGE, or SNEAKING BUDGE		One that slips into houses in the dark, to steal cloaks or other clothes. Also lambs' fur formerly used for doctors' robes, whence they were called budge doctors. Standing budge; a thief's scout or spy.
BUFF		All in buff; stript to the skin, stark naked.
BUMPING		A ceremony performed on boys perambulating the bounds of the parish on Whit-monday, when they have their posteriors bumped against the stones marking the boundaries, in order to fix them in their memory.
BUTTER AND EGGS TROT		A kind of short jogg trot, such as is used by women going to market, with butter and eggs. - he looks as if butter would not melt in her mouth, yet I warrant you cheese would not choak her; a saying of a demure looking woman, of suspected character. Don't make butter dear; a gird at the patient angler.
CANDLESTICKS		Bad, small, or untunable bells. Hark! how the candlesticks rattle.
CASE		A house; perhaps from the Italian CASA. In the canting lingo it meant store or ware house, as well as a dwelling house. Tout that case; mark or observe that house. It is all bob, now let's dub the gig of the case; now the coast is clear, let us break open the door of the house.
CLINK		A place in the Borough of Southwark, formerly privileged from arrests; and inhabited by lawless vagabonds of every denomination, called, from the place of their residence, clinkers. Also a gaol, from the clinking of the prisoners' chains or fetters: he is gone to clink.
CLOAK TWITCHERS		Rogues who lurk about the entrances into dark alleys, and bye-lanes, to snatch cloaks from the shoulders of passengers.
CLOTH MARKET		He is just come from the cloth market, i.e. from between the sheets, he is just risen from bed.
COVENT, or CONVENT GARDEN, vulgarly called COMMON		Anciently, the garden belonging to a dissolved monastery; now famous for being the chief market in London for fruit, flowers, and herbs. The theatres are situated near it. In its environs are many brothels, and not long ago, the lodgings of the second order of ladies of easy virtue were either there, or in the purlieus of Drury Lane.
CREW		A knot or gang; also a boat or ship's company. The canting crew are thus divided into twenty-three orders, which see under the different words: MEN. 1 Rufflers 2 Upright Men 3 Hookers or Anglers 4 Rogues 5 Wild Rogues 6 Priggers of Prancers 7 Palliardes 8 Fraters 9 Jarkmen, or Patricoes 10 Fresh Water Mariners, or Whip Jackets 11 Drummerers 12 Drunken Tinkers 13 Swadders, or Pedlars 14 Abrams. WOMEN. 1 Demanders for Glimmer or Fire 2 Bawdy Baskets 3 Morts 4 Autem Morts 5 Walking Morts 6 Doxies 7 Delles 8 Kinching Morts 9 Kinching Coes
CRIBBAGE-FACED		Marked with the small pox, the pits bearing a kind of resemblance to the holes in a cribbage-board.
DARK CULLY		A married man that keeps a mistress, whom he visits only at night, for fear of discovery.
DARKEE		A dark lanthorn used by housebreakers. Stow the darkee, and bolt, the cove of the crib is fly; hide the dark lanthorn, and run away, the master of the house knows that we are here.
DARKMAN'S BUDGE		One that slides into a house in the dark of the evening, and hides himself, in order to let some of the gang in at night to rob it.
DARKMANS		The night.
DAVID JONES		The devil, the spirit of the sea: called Necken in the north countries, such as Norway, Denmark, and Sweden.
DAY LIGHTS		Eyes. To darken his day lights, or sow up his sees; to close up a man's eyes in boxing.
DOCK		To lie with a woman. The cull docked the dell all the darkmans; the fellow laid with the wench all night. Docked smack smooth; one who has suffered an amputation of his penis from a venereal complaint. He must go into dock; a sea phrase, signifying that the person spoken of must undergo a salivation. Docking is also a punishment inflicted by sailors on the prostitutes who have infected them with the venereal disease; it consists in cutting off all their clothes, petticoats, shift and all, close to their stays, and then turning them into the street.
ESSEX LION		A calf; Essex being famous for calves, and chiefly supplying the London markets.
FERRARA		Andrea Ferrara; the name of a famous sword- cutler: most of the Highland broad-swords are marked with his name; whence an Andrea Ferrara has become the common name for the glaymore or Highland broad- sword. See GLAYMORE.
FINISH		The finish; a small coffee-house in Coven Garden, market, opposite Russel-street, open very early in the morning, and therefore resorted to by debauchees shut out of every other house: it is also called Carpenter's coffee-house.
FIRING A GUN		Introducing a story by head and shoulders. A man wanting to tell a particular story, said to the company, Hark! did you not hear a gun? - but now we are talking of a gun, I will tell you the story of one.
FOX		A sharp, cunning fellow. Also an old term for a sword, probably a rusty one, or else from its being dyed red with blood; some say this name alluded to certain swords of remarkable good temper, or metal, marked with the figure of a fox, probably the sign, or rebus, of the maker.
GLIM		A candle, or dark lantern, used in housebreaking; also fire. To glim; to burn in the hand.
GNARLER		A little dog that by his barking alarms the family when any person is breaking into the house.
GUY		A dark lanthorn: an allusion to Guy Faux, the principal actor in the gunpowder plot. Stow the guy: conceal the lanthorn.
HANGMAN'S WAGES		Thirteen pence halfpenny; which, according to the vulgar tradition, was thus allotted: one shilling for the executioner, and three halfpence for the rope, - N. B. This refers to former times; the hangmen of the present day having, like other artificers, raised their prices. The true state of this matter is, that a Scottish mark was the fee allowed for an execution, and the value of that piece was settled by a proclamation of James I. at thirteen pence halfpenny.
HARK-YE-ING		Whispering on one side to borrow money.
HELL		A taylor's repository for his stolen goods, called cabbage: see CABBAGE. Little hell; a small dark covered passage, leading from London-wall to Bell-alley.
HIGH EATING		To eat skylarks in a garret.
HOCKS		vulgar appellation for the feet. You have left the marks of your dirty hocks on my clean stairs; a frequent complaint from a mop squeezer to a footman.
HOG		A shilling. To drive one's hogs; to snore: the noise made by some persons in snoring, being not much unlike the notes of that animal. He has brought his hogs to a fine market; a saying of any one who has been remarkably successful in his affairs, and is spoken ironically to signify the contrary. A hog in armour; an awkward or mean looking man or woman, finely dressed, is said to look like a hog in armour. To hog a horse's mane; to cut it short, so that the ends of the hair stick up like hog's bristles. Jonian hogs; an appellation given to the members of St. John's College, Cambridge.
HOLIDAY		A holiday bowler; a bad bowler. Blind man's holiday; darkness, night. A holiday is any part of a ship's bottom, left uncovered in paying it. SEA TERM. It is all holiday; See ALL HOLIDAY.
HOLY FATHER		A butcher's boy of St. Patrick's Market, Dublin, or other Irish blackguard; among whom the exclamation, or oath, by the Holy Father (meaning the Pope), is common.
HOUSE, or TENEMENT, TO LET		A widow's weeds; also an atchievement marking the death of a husband, set up on the outside of a mansion: both supposed to indicate that the dolorous widow wants a male comforter.
JACK		A farthing, a small bowl serving as the mark for bowlers. An instrument for pulling off boots.
JACKMEN		See JARKMEN.
JARK		A seal.
JARKMEN		Those, who fabricate counterfeit passes, licences, and certificates for beggars.
KEMP'S SHOES		Would I had Kemp's shoes to throw after you. BEN JONSON. Perhaps Kemp was a man remarkable for his good luck or fortune; throwing an old shoe, or shoes, after any one going on an important business, being by the vulgar deemed lucky.
KENT-STREET EJECTMENT		To take away the street door: a method practised by the landlords in Kent-street, Southwark, when their tenants are above a fortnight's rent in arrear.
LANTHORN-JAWED		Thin-visaged: from their cheeksbeing almost transparent. Or else, lenten jawed; i.e. having the jaws of one emaciated by a too rigid observation of Lent. Dark lanthorn; a servant or agent at court, who receives a bribe for his principal or master.
LARK		A boat.
LARK		A piece of merriment. People playing together jocosely.
LAZY		As lazy as Ludman's dog, who leaned against the wall to bark. As lazy as the tinker, who laid down his budget to f - t.
LITTLE EASE		A small dark cell in Guildhall, London, where disorderly apprentices are confined by the city chamberlain: it is called Little Ease from its being so low that a lad cannot stand upright in it.
LOB'S POUND		A prison. Dr. Grey, in his notes on Hudibras, explains it to allude to one Doctor Lob, a dissenting preacher, who used to hold forth when conventicles were prohibited, and had made himself a retreat by means of a trap door at the bottom of his pulpit. Once being pursued by the officers of justice, they followed him through divers subterraneous passages, till they got into a dark cell, from whence they could not find their way out, but calling to some of their companions, swore they had got into Lob's Pound.
LUD'S BULWARK		Ludgate prison.
MOLL THOMPSON'S MARK		M. T. i.e. empty: as, Take away this bottle, it has Moll Thompson's mark upon it.
MOONCURSER		A link-boy: link-boys are said to curse the moon, because it renders their assistance unnecessary; these gentry frequently, under colour of lighting passengers over kennels, or through dark passages, assist in robbing them.
MUD LARK		A fellow who goes about by the water side picking up coals, nails, or other articles in the mud. Also a duck.
NICK		To win at dice, to hit the mark just in the nick of time, or at the critical moment.
NICKNAME		A name given in ridicule or contempt: from the French nom de niqne. Niqne is a movement of the head to mark a contempt for any person or thing.
PARK PAILING		Teeth.
PIG		Sixpence, a sow's baby. Pig-widgeon; a simpleton. To pig together; to lie or sleep together, two or more in a bed. Cold pig; a jocular punishment inflicted by the maid seryants, or other females of the house, on persons lying over long in bed: it consists in pulling off all the bed clothes, and leaving them to pig or lie in the cold. To buy a pig in a poke; to purchase any thing without seeing. Pig's eyes; small eyes. Pigsnyes; the same: a vulgar term of endearment to a woman. He can have boiled pig at home; a mark of being master of his own house: an allusion to a well known poem and story. Brandy is Latin for pig and goose; an apology for drinking a dram after either.
PRICK-EARED		A prick-eared fellow; one whose ears are longer than his hair: an appellation frequently given to puritans, who considered long hair as the mark of the whore of Babylon.
QUEER		To puzzle or confound. I have queered the old full bottom; i.e. I have puzzled the judge. To queer one's ogles among bruisers; to darken one's day lights.
RED LETTER DAY		A saint's day or holiday, marked in the calendars with red letters. Red letter men; Roman Catholics: from their observation of the saint days marked in red letters.
ROW		To row in the same boat; to be embarked in the same scheme.
SALESMAN'S DOG		A barker. Vide BARKER.
SEA LAWYER		A shark.
SHARK		A sharper: perhaps from his preying upon any one he can lay hold of. Also a custom-house officer, or tide-waiter. Sharks; the first order of pickpockets. BOW- STREET TERM, A.D. 1785.
SHITTING THROUGH THE TEETH		Vomiting. Hark ye, friend, have you got a padlock on your arse, that you shite through your teeth? Vulgar address to one vomiting.
SINGLETON		A corkscrew, made by a famous cutler of that name, who lived in a place called Hell, in Dublin; his screws are remarkable for their excellent temper.
SIZAR		Formerly students who came to Cambridge University for purposes of study and emolument. But at present they are just as gay and dissipated as their fellow collegians. About fifty years ago they were on a footing with the servitors at Oxford, but by the exertions of the present Bishop of Llandaff, who was himself a sizar, they were absolved from all marks of inferiority or of degradation. The chief difference at present between them and the pensioners, consists in the less amount of their college fees. The saving thus made induces many extravagant fellows to become sizars, that they may have more money to lavish on their dogs, pieces, etc.
SPARK		A spruce, trim, or smart fellow. A man that is always thirsty, is said to have a spark in his throat.
SPARKING BLOWS		Blows given by cocks before they close, or, as the term is, mouth it: used figuratively for words previous to a quarrel.
SPARKISH		Fine, gay.
SQUIB		A small satirical or political temporary jeu d'esprit, which, like the firework of that denomination, sparkles, bounces, stinks, and vanishes.
TAR		Don't lose a sheep for a halfpennyworth of tar: tar is used to mark sheep. A jack tar; a sailor.
TRAY TRIP		An ancient game like Scotch hop, played on a pavement marked out with chalk into different compartments.
TURK		A cruel, hard-hearted man. Turkish treatment; barbarous usage. Turkish shore; Lambeth, Southwark, and Rotherhithe side of the Thames.
VIXEN		A termagant; also a she fox, who, when she has cubs, is remarkably fierce.
WELCH RABBIT		Welch rare-bit. Bread and cheese toasted. See RABBIT. - The Welch are said to be so remarkably fond of cheese, that in cases of difficulty their midwives apply a piece of toasted cheese to the janua vita to attract and entice the young Taffy, who on smelling it makes most vigorous efforts to come forth.
WHETSTONE'S PARK		A lane between Holborn and Lincoln's-inn Fields, formerly famed for being the resort of women of the town.
WHIT		Whittington's Newgate. - Five rum-padders are rubbed in the darkmans out of the whit, and are piked into the deuseaville; five highwaymen broke out of Newgate in the night, and are gone into the country.
WILD-GOOSE CHASE		A tedious uncertain pursuit, like the following a flock of wild geese, who are remarkably shy.
WRAPT UP IN WARM FLANNEL		Drunk with spirituous liquors. He was wrapt up in the tail of his mother's smock; saying of any one remarkable for his success with the ladies. To be wrapt up in any one: to have a good opinion of him, or to be under his influence.