or blowing, subs. (old).—A woman (like MORT q.v.). Chaste or not: Subsequently = a showy courtesan, or common prostitute: it still retains the latter meaning, but is still frequently used, in a more complimentary sense than heretofore, to signify a finely built handsome, and, as the old barrel-organ man says, FUCKABLE (q.v.) girl: in America (criminal classes) = a mistress.
Derivation uncertain, two suggestions: (1) from ‘blown upon’; and (2) a blossom—a pet: see PETTICOAT and TART.
1688. SHADWELL, The Squire of Alsatia, I., in Wks. (1720) IV., 17. What ogling there will be between thee and the BLOWINGS!
c. 1696. B. E., A New Dictionary of the Canting Crew, s.v.
1789. G. PARKER, Life’s Painter, 143. BLOWEN, a woman.
1819. J. H. VAUX, A Vocabulary of the Flash Language. BLOWEN, a prostitute; a woman who cohabits with a man without marriage.
1823. GROSE, Classical Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue [EGAN], s.v. NUTS. … The cove’s nutting the BLOWEN; the man is trying to please the girl.
1847. BULWER-LYTTON, Lucretia, II., ii. ‘If she’s a good girl, and loves you, she’ll not let you spend your money on her.’ ‘I haint such a ninny as that,’ said Beck, with majestic contempt. ‘I spises the flat that is done brown by the BLOWENS.’
1848. C. KINGSLEY, Yeast, xi. Why don’t they have a short simple service, now and then, that might catch the ears of the roughs and the BLOWENS, without tiring out the poor thoughtless creatures’ patience, as they do now?
