Obs. Also Titire-Tu, Tytire tu, Tytere-tu, Tittery tu, tittyry. [From L. Tītyre tū, the first words of Virgil’s first eclogue, ‘Tityre, tu patulæ recubans sub tegmine fagi,’ adopted as a designation.]

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  One of an association of well-to-do ‘roughs’ who infested London streets in the 17th c.

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  The name ‘meant to imply that these blades were men of leisure and fortune, who “lay at ease under their patrimonial beech trees”’ (Brewer, Reader’s Handbk.).

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1623.  J. Chamberlain, Lett. to Sir D. Carleton, 6 Dec., in Crt. & Times Jas. I. (1848), II. 438. There is a crew or knot of such people … who … have made an association, and taken certain oaths and orders devised among themselves;… having certain nicknames, as Tityre-tu, and such like, for their several fraternities.

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1630.  J. Taylor (Water P.), Navy Land Ships, Wks. I. 77/2. Roaring boyes, and Rough-hewd Tittery tues.

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1648.  Herrick, Hesper., New Year’s Gift to Sir S. Steward. No newes of navies burnt at seas; No noise of late spawn’d tittyries.

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1693.  Southerne, Maid’s Last Prayer, II. ii. I remember your Dammee-Boyes, your Swashes, your Tuquoques and your Titire-Tues.

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1849.  Macaulay, Hist. Eng., iii. I. 361, note. It may be suspected that some of the Tityre Tus, like good cavaliers, broke Milton’s windows shortly after the Restoration.

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