wapping dell
English edit
Etymology edit
From wap (“to engage in sexual intercourse”) + dell (“young woman”).
Noun edit
wapping dell (plural wapping dells)
- (obsolete, UK, thieves' cant) A prostitute.
- 1665, Richard Head, The English Rogue[1], page 45:
- And wapping Dell, that niggles well, / And takes loure for her hire.
- 1922, James Joyce, “Proteus”, in Ulysses, page 47:
- Buss her, wap in rogue’s rum lingo, for, O, my dimber wapping dell.
Synonyms edit
- wapping moll, wapping mort, see also Thesaurus:prostitute
References edit
- John S[tephen] Farmer; W[illiam] E[rnest] Henley, compilers (1904) “wapping dell”, in Slang and Its Analogues Past and Present. […], volume VII, [London: […] Neill and Co.] […], →OCLC, pages 292–293.
- Eric Partridge (1949) A Dictionary of the Underworld, London: Macmillan Co.