As others have mentioned, many people use rhyming slang without being aware of it. We also get rhyming slang on rhyming slang. Take for example "Shift your arris", short for 'Aristotle' ryming with 'bottle'. Bottle (Bottle and Glass)in turn rymes with 'arse'. There is also a lot of contrived rhyming slang originating in TV programmes. In 'Minder' for example, Terry and Arthur always called the telephone the 'Dog and Bone'. All the time I lived in East London the 'phone was 'The Blower' or if someone wanted you to 'phone them it would be "give us a bell" Years ago our local library had a huge volume on ryming slang which went into great detail on the dates a word was used, where in the world it was used, etc. Does anyone know of this book and it's title.
|