Words we don't use any more

I grew up using the word 'bedspread', not counterpane. I was at loss when I heard the word for the first time when I was in hospital. I too remember it as being an item like a damask tablecloth and when there was a counterpane on the bed - as in hospital - there was no eiderdown.

I thought stocious or stoatin’ drunk was a Scottish thing. I’d never heard it in Yorkshire before I moved to Scotland.

Here in Gainsborough and also in Hull, (where I lived, anyway) the back alley is the tenfoot.
Both my father and my partner's used to refer to people (usually other drivers) as "blithering idiots".
My mother used to refer to drunk people as "stocious" but I don't know whether that is a family or regional thing.

We put the counterpane on top of the eiderdown and it was taken off at night. In Bill Bryson's Notes from a Small Island, he tells of the sign on the wall in a B&B he stayed at stipulating that the "counterpane should be removed at night". Being American, he had no idea what the counterpane was - he thought it was part of the window!

And mine was pink .candlewick. I remember pulling the little tufts out when I was bored.

sarahcyn

There was a TV ad for the Playtex Cross Your Heart Bra which absolutely fascinated me as a child, especially the bit where the friend says "I have midriff bulge, I need a longline bra"

Midriff bulge - it sounded like some kind of mysterious congenital medical condition to me at the time..

In my boarding school one of the women we had looking after us was a "Matron Bowles" and when I saw that ad on TV I thought at first they were saying "Gets rid of Matron Bowles" rather than "Midriff bulge"! (I wish!)

More front than Blackpool
All fur coat and no knickers

Slap and tickle. A bit of the other.

How's yer father.

Yes they're the ones I remember too Grannynannywanny, blue as far as I recall, but probably varied hospital to hospital.

Hanky Panky.

The hospital counterpanes I remember in the 70’s were similar to a heavy damask style tablecloth .

Witzend

sarahcyn

watermeadow

Up in’t north a ginnel were a snicket.
My mother used to call synthetic cream Zinc ointment, which was used for nappy rash. Babies also used to posset and had three month colic.
Horses got strangles, puppies caught hard pad, old men died of apoplexy. Migraine was a sick headache.
Teeth were gnashers, a nose was a conk. If brainy you were a big head or a smart-arse.
At school Domestic Science was cookery and Swedish Drill was exercises. The 11 plus was the Scholarship exam. Prefects were Monitors.
This could go on forever.

Babies still posset, though annoyingly the American "spit up" is used rather more.
I've never heard of "three month colic" but all my clients seem to have heard of "colic" even though it's a vague collection of symptoms rather than an actual disease.

My dd2 had classic three months’ colic!

My DD had colic.
She carried on having colic for years until coeliac disease was diagnosed.

When I was young an eiderdown was the puffed up duvet-type 'thing' that was the very top layer. It would be the exact width of the bed, but didn't cover the pillows. The counterpane was the large thinner covering that went underneath the eiderdown but over the blankets and pillows and hung down over the sides.

Candlewick

Is it like an eiderdown?
Bedspread?
Haven't heard those words for yonks <<-- another one.

Yes, I remember that from when I was in hospital in 1986 for a few weeks. There is a Robert Louis Stevenson poem called The Land of Counterpane, which I remember from when I was a child because I didn’t know what a counterpane was.

When I started my nursing training in the early 70’s the top layer of bedding was referred to as a counterpane. There would be a top sheet, 2 cellular cotton blankets and the counterpane. The hospital counterpanes were heavy white cotton with a slightly embossed pattern.

Rocketstop2

What about a 'Counterpane' on the bed ?!!

That's a bit posh. We called it a bedspread.

I have been reading all the posts and I would like to say thank you to all of you for making this thread so interesting and enjoyable so far.

Thank you all for a wonderful, evocative thread. I can’t add anything to it but have learned a lot and have some new words to try out.

Groovy, far out.

sarahcyn

watermeadow

Up in’t north a ginnel were a snicket.
My mother used to call synthetic cream Zinc ointment, which was used for nappy rash. Babies also used to posset and had three month colic.
Horses got strangles, puppies caught hard pad, old men died of apoplexy. Migraine was a sick headache.
Teeth were gnashers, a nose was a conk. If brainy you were a big head or a smart-arse.
At school Domestic Science was cookery and Swedish Drill was exercises. The 11 plus was the Scholarship exam. Prefects were Monitors.
This could go on forever.

Babies still posset, though annoyingly the American "spit up" is used rather more.
I've never heard of "three month colic" but all my clients seem to have heard of "colic" even though it's a vague collection of symptoms rather than an actual disease.

My dd2 had classic three months’ colic!

Thoro

My parents used to say to change from our school uniforms into mufti

I think that came from the Armed Forces, changing out of their uniforms.

Oreo

Dolly Daydream

That's what my dad used to call me, as well as "butterfly brain".
(Turned out it was because I have ADHD)

GreyKnitter

Vestibule - entrance hall and quilt for duvet.

I seem to remember they were originally referred to as "continental quilts".