Winchester Notions

This is an awful pseudo language used at, and only at Winchester College. Many of the notions in the Notion Book have fallen out of use. I enclose a couple for your delectation, and will return to add more with time. If I can actually find a copy of the book anywhere I will node it all, but for now here are the important ones for any potential Wykehamists:

athla: athletics.

to brock: to bully.

bogle (noun or verb): bicycle.

bookschamber (bookscha, bookie): a free lesson. Where one is meant to study or work. What a joke!

clint fort: a Colinism for Flint Court.

colinism: any malapropism used by Mr Colin Upton, a mathma don.

div: a combined subject, typically comprising elements of English, History, religious studies, and current affairs.

divdon: a teacher who teaches this subject.

don: teacher.

fo (foricas): toilet.

firk: to expel.

Flint Court: a large courtyard around which the school's classrooms are located.

hour: a lesson. This actually only takes 40 minutes, which always confuses people.

housedon: housemaster, i.e. evil overlord who runs a boarding house.

jun: junior. Also the junior steeplechase.

mathma: maths.

Porter's Lodge (a.k.a. Porter's Todge): a building where the porter resides.

rusticate: to suspend.

sergeants: a punishment in which a boy must get up and walk down to Porter's Lodge, where he signs his name on a list to prove he has actually done it.

sen: senior. Also the name of the senior steeplechase.

spree: cheeky, especially of a jun. man towards a sen. one.

up to books: in lessons. This refers to either being in a lesson, or the time when lessons are happening.

up town: in the actual town of Winchester. Defined as being north of the cathedral.

Alongside the standard notions there is a deeply bizarre slang language which has organically evolved into something used by many members of the school over the last 5 years or so.

Essentially, you speak it by saying ordinary words in an odd accent to make them negative. Often, of course, because their use is usually sarcastic, this will involve a double negative, which can be rather confusing for the uninitiated.

So:

If you want to say 'the dog is extremely ugly' you would say 'the dog is naaht very ugly.' Naaht is a corruption of not. Elongate the aa sound. Naaht rhymes with 'part' pronounced by someone very posh.

There are many variations and different sounds used: slightly different dialects crop up in different houses in the school, but are all comprehensible once you get the basic structure.

Some more examples to help you make sense of it:

(all of these would mean 'the dog is ugly')

• the dog is ney very ugly (another corruption of 'not)
• the dog is quat beautiful (quat a version of 'quite')
• the dog is squibblydibbly beautiful (I have no idea where this one comes from)
• I lack your dog's face (ie, I dislike your dog's face because the dog is very ugly)
• I many times lack your dog's face (a more complex construction: not sure shat the origin of 'many times' is)
• Your dog is bee-ow-tee-ful

Here is a sample conversation between two fluent native speakers. See if you can follow it:

• I really like Sandra. i think she is a very beautiful, very sweet girl, and she's naaht got the enormous pair of bosoms
• she's quat got the enormous bosoms! and she's swoit!
• she's squibbly naaht got the enormous bosoms! Anyway, your friend Mary is many times as attractive!
• Mary's queet naaht many times as attractive!
• (etc., descending in to fisticuffs)

it is important to note that should you wish to try your hand at this, all words in a clause containing a slang word MUST be pronounced in a kind of sing-song tone. Otherwise, for example, 'she's many times as attractive could be taken seriously.

Don't worry if it's all a little confusing. Seasoned pros make the occasional mistake, particularly when using a double or triple instance of slang (such as 'she's queet naaht many times as attractive!) for emphasis: it's very easy to get mixed up about whether you're emphasising something or deriding it. However, tone and context will usually clear this up. If you want to begin with something simple, try saying 'quat' or 'queet' on it's own to suggest your disagreement with whatever they have said. so:

• The second world war began in 1977.
• Quat!

You could also do the opposite with 'naaht':

• Are you a fan of Britney Spears?
• I'm naaht.

one more:

• have you got my money?
• Gaat.

Keep it simple at first. You may be able to move on to more complex constructions later, but take it a step at a time. The slang is constantly evolving, and you are quite free to add to it. One interesting recent development is a new trend for using vast numbers of slang phrases in whatever order -becoming, essentially, nonsense - to indicate at once an appreciation for something and yet also your ironic understanding of how silly both the slang and the thing you appreciate are.ie:

'Dawson's Creek is squibbly dibbly many times naaht queet a loot the boost programme on TV!

There is something of a danger of confusion here. Tread carefully. You may find you cannot stop talking like this and all your friends will start to hate you.

• turst, burst ----- cigarette (eg. Anyone for a turst?)
• fish ----- stuff (eg. What about all that Second World War fish that we have to write for toyetime?)
• ooth ----- a corruption of 'yes' (from yeth) i.e. meaning 'no'.
• Feesh, Neesh, Guiche----- all variations on 'no' from varying pronunciation of 'ooth'.
• meats, pats, TFC (Thanks For Coming), thunkth, chunkth ----- all equivalent ejaculations said by those who have heard a particularly pointless, convoluted or just generally stupid comment, and usually directed at the speaker of said comment. Also said when somebody embarasses themselves (eg. by tripping over, dropping a plate of food, etc.). Meats is from 'mates', so I'm told, and thunkth and chunkth come from 'thanks'. 'Neesh' etc. come from slurred pronunciation of 'nat', a corruption of 'not' used to illustrate a positive (eg. that Swithunite is nat fit = she is attractive).

Thankfully I have now left the aforementioned college and can no longer comment on its continually-evolving auxiliary language.