"The fairies only left Orkney when folk stopped seekin' them" - Anonymous Orcadian
"Never be afraid to seek" - Ally

Saturday, March 01, 2008

'arris?

My brother & I got onto the subject of this last Saturday, but I've only just remembered about it now...

Conversation went something like this:

Brother: Blah blah blah blah Cock Sparrow... with feathers all stubby and brown...
Ally: No... that was the Ugly Duckling... coz Frank Butcher did a version of that song, and I had it on my blog...
B: Frank Butcher?
A: Mike Reid...
B: Ah. And all of the birds...
A: In so many words, said "Sling yer 'arris"...

B: 'arris?
A: Cockney rhyming slang for arse... *wonders* How the hell does that work?
B: Harris... tweed? Harris... and Uist?

Anyway, we drew a complete blank, so off went brother to look it up on the computer - and it is possibly the most convoluted, dodgiest piece of Cockney rhyming slang ever! Here's what we found...

Noun. Buttocks, 'arse'. Convoluted Cockney rhyming slang for 'arse'; Arris, an abbreviation of Aristotle, rhyming with bottle, and thereafter leading to bottle and glass rhyming with 'arse'. Also aris.

See what I mean?

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