Fuckin Abbot

34 NOTES AND QUERIES March 1993
use of the word 'alias' is a further, small, pointer
in this direction. If the author could read Latin,
that, and the gender-related history of the taboo
word, one which was used predominantly by
men of men, would indicate that the writer of the
marginalia was male. Since we do not know if the
manuscript was owned by, or only on loan to,
the word's writer we cannot determine whether
the occasion of use of the taboo word was
wholly private or, in some sense, social: whether
the marginalium reflected a private exasperation,
never intended for other eyes, over an
Abbot who had a history of arousing resentment,
or whether, if the manuscript was only on
loan, the writer expected or hoped that his
comments would be read by others on its return.
We can properly suppose that a handwritten
comment, not intended for later printed publication,
would confer a particular freedom of
expression, and, on the basis of Scottish usage in
the sixteenth century, it could be inferred that in
England, too, the use of this taboo word in
satiric attacks on ecclesiastics had a generic
acceptability which conferred a further licence
for its employment."
EDWARD WILSON
Worcester College, Oxford
" The credit for noticing the marginalia in the Brasenose
MS belongs to the late Mr Robin Peedell, formerly Assistant
Librarian of the College; they were brought to my attention
through the good offices of Mr L. D. Reynolds, Fellow of
Brasenose College and Professor M. Winterbottom, Corpus
Christi College, Oxford. I am grateful also to the Principal and
Fellows of Brasenose College for permission to quote from
their manuscript.
CAXON, CAXTON: A PREDATING,
A DEFINITION, AND
A SUPPOSED DERIVATION
OED has the following entry s.v. Caxon, sb. 1
'(?from the personal surname Caxon] A kind of
wig, now obsolete'. Illustrative quotations are
taken from works applearing between 1756 and
1834.
A much more precise definition, however,
can be found in an earlier work. Jane Barker, in
the 'Introduction' to A Patch-Work Screen for
Ladies (1723),' depicts people telling stories to
1 Jane Barker, A Patch- Work Screen for the Ladies; or
Love and Virtue Recommended (1723; repr. New York and
London, 1973).
while away a stagecoach journey. One passenger
'ask[s] the Company, If they knew how il—
dress'd Perukes came to be called KaxtonsT
('Introduction', sig. A3b), and then tells the
story of a thief who murdered a farmer, the
farmer's wife, and a new baby.
He [the thief] was hang'd in Chains by the
Road-side near Kaxton [presumably Caxton,
9 miles west of Cambridge]; an Example of
the most vile Cruelty that could be committed.
There happen'd to pass some Cambridge
Scholars that Way to visit some Friends thereabouts;
and the Weather being a little turbulent,
the Wind and Wet so discompos'd
their Wiggs, that when they came in, they
fancy'd them to look like that on the Head of
the Hang'd Man. This Fancy they carry'd
back with them to Cambridge, and there
broach'd it amongst the Youth of their Time;
which, by Degrees, spread over the Nation.
Afterwards, ... this Fancy was carried
[abroad], so that in most Parts of Europe, to
this Day, an ill-dress'd Wigg is call'd
A CAXTON, OR KAK.(sig. A5b)
Although the supposed derivation is probably
a fancy of the author, the definition seems
accurate. Certainly, none of the quotations in
OED opposes Barker's definition. Further
support comes from the much later definition of
Francis Grose: 'CAXON. An old weatherbeaten
wig' (Classical Dictionary of the Vulgar
Tongue, 1785), and from Charles Lamb's
description of Rev. James Boyer's 'passy, or
passionate wig' as 'an old discoloured, unkempt,
angry caxon' ('Christ's Hospital Five and Thirty
Years ago'). Eric Partridge finds a continuation
in theatrical slang: 'caxon, caxton and Caxton
(theatrical) a wig, c. 19-20, ob ' (Dictionary
of Slang and Unconventional English, 1984).
Partridge, however, opposes the slang definition
of Grose to the supposed standard English
definition of The Shorter Oxford English Dictionary,
taken from OED. Since the supposed
standard definition is suspiciously vague,
whereas the definitions of Barker and Grose are
both precise, agreeing with one another and
with the examples given in OED, the revisors
should consider rewording the entry in OED.
Barker's diminutive kak does not otherwise
appear, but might be added to the entry for caxy.
Downloaded from
http://nq.oxfordjournals.org/
at Bodleian Library on January 19, 2013