h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Recently and quite unsurprisingly I made a pratt of myself and a girl I know said "You divvy" which is a wonderfully concise little insult and got me wondering where it came from. It sounds like it is abreviation so I was just wondering if anyone knows to what it refers or where it comes from?

Could be from divot developed from clod .....

I like that, sounds good to me and reasonable enough. Anyone else?

Like the current mot do nos jours "chav", "divvy" originates in Romany slang.

H.

No it does'nt Chav means...Council House And Violent

Or if in Newcastle 'Council House And Rather Violent'

I understand that the term 'divvy' is considered a compliment in the world of antiques.

I have yet to find one of those supposed etymologies based on initials (Port Out Starboard Home, Fornicate Under Command of the King, Orl Korrect, etc etc etc) which was not made up.

Chav does sound Romany to me, though my knowledge of Romany could be written on a lollipop by a gigolo using a cosh.

In fact, a quick google gives you: http://www2.arnes.si/~eusmith/Romany/loanwords.html

and if you look under the letter C here you find it:
http://www.geocities.com/Paris/5121/rumney.htm

B

My Mum used to collect divvy stamps from the co-op, is that relevant?

Co op divvy was short for dividend. Your Mum got a percentage of what she spent refunded in the form of stamps that could be spent, in the Co op of course, like cash. I'm not sure which came before which but there was another Co op scheme where you had to quote a number and the cashier gave you a receipt to record the ammount of divvy you were entitled to.....

I'm pretty sure, as Albatross said, that it's an abbreviation of 'divot'. Perhaps we should call some people a 'mup' or 'id' or 'wan'.

The Romany word-list given above says:

divio, divi, didlo - crazy

so it looks as if Hoo is right. Also, on re-reading my rather snappy post yesterday, I have to admit that SNAFU, FUNDY, etc are all WWII acronyms. Mea culpa.

B

Actually, this list is pretty cool.

'Devel' or 'Duvvel' means 'God', and 'Develésko mush' is Jesus Christ.

'Drab' is 'poison' and 'drabéngro, drabméngro - doctor'.

'hotchi' is hedgehog and 'hótchiméngri' - frying pan. Mmmmmm.

'narked, narkri' - 'dark, dank, bad, unpleasant' which is interersting. I wonder if that is the origin of 'a copper's nark'.

Ben

>> No it does'nt Chav means...Council House And Violent <<

No, this is a back-formation like posh (port out starboard home). I think ned also comes into this category.

I've always understood div to be short for divot. In fact (reaches back into depths of memory to schooldays) I think we called each other divots way back then.

RF