ppl. adj. (old).—Pre-eminent in rascality: see quot. 1866 and ANOINT, sense 3.
1769. W. ROBERTSON, The History of the Reign of the Emperor Charles V, II. 108. Their ANOINTED malefactors, as they call them, seldom suffered capitally, even for the most atrocious crimes.
1820. DUNCOMBE, Flash Dictionary, s.v. ANOINTED. Knowing; ripe for mischief.
1824. SCOTT, St. Ronan’s Well, xxxvi. ‘But, not being Lord Etherington, and an ANOINTED scoundrel into the bargain, I will content myself with cudgelling him to death.
1866. SKEAT [Notes and Queries, 3. S. ix. 422]. In a French MS…. is an account of a man who had received a thorough and severe beating: Qui anoit este si bien oignt. The English version [Early English Text Society] translates this, ‘which so well was ANOYNTED indeed.’ From this it is clear that to ANOINT a man was to give him a sound drubbing, and that the word was so used in the fifteenth century. Thus, an ANOINTED rogue means either one who has been well thrashed or who has deserved to be.
1882. SMYTHE PALMER, Folk-Etymology, s.v. ANOINTED … without doubt, a corruption of the French anoienté (ROQUEFORT), another form of anéanti, brought to nothing, worthless, good for nothing.
