monkiker

[Palewriter]

moniker (n)

A nickname or assumed name.

The etymology of this word is curious. Supposedly from Shelta, a kind of patois once found among Irish and English itinerants, which was based on the reversal of consonants in Gaelic words.

And the first Agoran who makes a "gimme shelta" comment will be awarded the PW 2006 Wall of Shame Award.

-- PW

[skinem]

Come on people now, we don't want any war, children, do we?
I'll have to do some digging on Shelta---haven't heard of it before.
We do have some interesting monikers on Agora, don't we?

I'll just fade away now...

[Bailey]

Well, whattya know

Shel·ta (shlt)
n.
A secret jargon used by traditionally itinerant people in Great Britain and Ireland, based on systematic inversion or alteration of the initial consonants of Gaelic words. Also called Cant, Gammon.



[From Shelta Sheldr, perhaps alteration of Irish Gaelic béarla, language, English, from Old Irish bélrae, language, from bél, mouth.]

The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition copyright ©2000 by Houghton Mifflin Company. Updated in 2003. Published by Houghton Mifflin Company. All rights reserved

mark shelta-is-also-a-company-in-Australia Bailey

They make shelters umbrellas and the like, but since it's pronounced shelta there anyway....

[gailr]

Etymonline says:

1849, said to be originally a hobo term (but attested in London underclass from 1851), of uncertain origin; perhaps from monk (monks and nuns take new names with their vows, and early 19c. British tramps referred to themselves as "in the monkery").

Get thee to a monkery doesn't have quite the same sting, although it might fit PW's forbidden pun. Thus, give a guy a new identity and enough rope and it will become a habit?

-gailr
who thinks there might be a "stole" joke in there someplace, but isn't coming up with anything...

[Bailey]

Wait! is this Moniker or Monkiker? Somehow I doubt if it has anything to do with monks here.

However,I'm NOT an RC but I thought Priests wore stoles not nuns or Monks. But perhaps they wear them to bed in their unheated cells.

mark men-in-skirts Bailey

[skinem]

Wait! is this Moniker or Monkiker? Somehow I doubt if it has anything to do with monks here.

I thought this thread was about mongrel monkeys...