(-um), -her, -him, -it. colloq. Less commonly what-do-you-call-’em, etc.; also variously abbreviated (see quots.); also simply 7–8 what-d’ye-call. See also β below. [WHAT pron. A. 1.] An appellation for a thing or person whose name the speaker forgets, does not know or wish to mention, or thinks not worth mentioning. Also occas. substituted for any word (e.g., an adjective) which the speaker fails to recall.
1639. [J. Taylor (Water P.)], Divers Crabtree Lect., 217. I … gave her a sound spurnne upon the Buttocks:… O my what doe you call’t, said shee.
1641. Cowley, Guardian, V. v. Dog.… How the what-d’ye-call-’um runs? What do ye call it? Pun. Time, Sir.
c. 1646. Milton, Sonn., On new forcers Consc., 12. By shallow Edwards and Scotch what d’ye call.
1678. Dryden, Kind Keeper, III. i. His Father was Squire what-d’you call him, of what d’you call ’em Shire.
1704. Swift, T. Tub, Pref. 17. Spoken by Mr. Whatdicall’um.
1752. Foote, Taste, II. She was a kind of a what d’ ye call ’em … a sort of a Queen or Wife, or something or other to somebody, that liv’d a damn’d while ago.
1765. Sterne, Tr. Shandy, VIII. xix. There being so many tendons and what d’ye call-’ems all about it.
1773. H. Walpole, Lett. to W. Cole, 8 Jan. Mr. What-d’ ye-call-him’s pamphlet.
1779. Mme. D’Arblay, Diary, 16 June. Miss What-d’ ye-call-her.
1806. Surr, Winter in Lond., III. 257. We … went to that public house or what-d’ye-call, in Piccadilly.
1827. Scott, Chron. Canongate, iii. There is good accommodation at the what-d’ ye-call-’em arms.
1838. Dickens, Nich. Nick., xxv. To break up old associations and what-do-you-callems of that kind.
1870. Lowell, Study Wind., 74. As legitimate a subject of human study as the glacial period or the silurian what-d’ ye-call-ems.
1875. F. E. Trollope, Charm. Fellow, i. College is out of the question … unless he entered himself as a what-do-you-call-it?… A sizar.
† β. In contracted forms whatd’ecalt, what d’ee cal’t, what-d’ye-caw’t, whatchicalt, whatsha-callum, etc. (cf. WASHICAL): sometimes analysed as = what shall I call...? Obs.
1593. G. Harvey, Pierce’s Super., Wks. (Grosart), II. 57. Hollinsheads engrosing; some-bodies abridging; and whatchicaltes translating.
1598. B. Jonson, Ev. Man in Hum., I. ii. (1601), B 4. Didst thou not see a fellow here in a whatsha-callum doublet?
1632. Brome, North. Lasse, V. v. Your great acquaintance, and alliance in the Whatshicall Court Non obstante. Ibid. (1641), Jov. Crew, II. (1661), F 1. Rogue enough though, to offer us his whatd’ecalts? his Doxies.
1654. R. Whitlock, Ζωοτομια, 121. What think you Sir of your what-sha’come Water and Diascord?
1658. A. Fox, trans. Würtz’ Surg., II. xxviii. 188. It is called also the not-named, or (a whats you call) an unknown Sore, no body knows what it is.
1673. S’ too him Bayes, 55. I came onely to … be a witness for the orthodoxness of what d’ee cal’t.
1691. Mrs. D’Anvers, Academia, 10. ’Tis, let me see, now, whach’ee call, Syncategorematical.
a. 1807. J. Skinner, Songs & Poems (1859), 43. That camsteary—what-d’ye-caw’t? (I think it’s genius, walie fa’t).
1820. Scott, Abbot, xxvi. My Lady What-shall-call ’um’s powder.
γ. So what-ye (or -you) -call(-it, etc.), later usually what-you-may-call-it [WHAT pron. C. 4].
1598. Chapman, Blinde Beg. Alexandria, Plays, 1873, I. 28. Eli. Why hees a what you calt. Mar. A what you call it can you not name it.
1600. Shaks., A. Y. L., III. iii. 74. Good euen good Mr what ye cal’t.
16[?]. Middleton, etc., Old Law, III. ii. Lis. Heeres your first weapon ducks meat. Sim. How, a dutch what you call em, Stead of a German falchion.
1848. Dickens, Dombey, xxvii. There is no What’s-his-name but Thingummy, and What-you-may-call-it is his prophet!
1870. Mary Bridgman, Robt. Lynne, xxiv. Fine place, Bob; built by the what you may-call-its.
1891. Kipling, Light that Failed, ix. Say good-bye to the what-you-call-um girl.
