Faggot

subs. (common).—1.  A term of opprobrium applied to women; a ‘baggage.’ [At one time a faggot was a popular symbol of recantation of opinions thought worthy only of burning (Bailey, 1728), and heretics who had thus escaped the stake were required either to bear a faggot and burn it in public, or to wear an imitation on the sleeve as a badge.] Also used in combination: e.g., BED- (or STRAW-) FAGGOT = a wife, or mistress; TUMBLE-FAGGOT = a whoremaster; CARRY-FAGGOT = a mattress; and SPIKE- (or TICKLE-) FAGGOT (obsolete) = the penis.

  1820.  REYNOLDS (‘Peter Corcoran’), The Fancy, p. 16.

  2.  (common).—See quot., 1851.

  1851–61.  H. MAYHEW, London Labour and the London Poor, vol. ii., p. 255. He then made his supper, or second meal, for tea he seldom touched, on ‘FAGOTS.’ This preparation … is a sort of cake, roll, or ball, a number being baked at a time, and is made of chopped liver and lights, mixed with gravy, and wrapped in pieces of pig’s caul. It weighs six ounces, so that it is unquestionably a cheap [it costs 1d. hot] and, to the scavager, a savoury meal, but to other nostrils its odour is not seductive.

  1870.  London Figaro, 2 July. Have you more than a penny? A glorious perspective opens out before you of all the delicacies of the season, commencing with trotters—the harmless mutton, or toe succulent swine; ‘FAGGOTS,’ etc.

  1884.  Cornhill Magazine, June, p. 615. They can obtain hot FAGGOTS, hot baked potatoes, hot fried fish, or a cut of pork with hot pease-pudding.

  3.  (old).—A ‘dummy’ soldier; one hired to appear at a muster to hide deficiencies. Many names of dummies would appear on the muster-roll: for these the colonel drew pay, but they were never in the ranks.

  1672–1719.  ADDISON [quoted in Imperial Dictionary]. There were several counterfeit books which were carved in wood, and served only to fill up the number like FAGOTS in the muster of a regiment.

  1728.  BAILEY, Dictionarium Britannicum, s.v.

  1785.  GROSE, A Classical Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue, s.v.

  Verb (old).—1.  To bind hand and foot; to tie [as sticks into a FAGGOT]. Fr., un fagot = a convict, because bound to a common chain on their way to the hulks.

  1728.  BAILEY, Dictionarium Britannicum, s.v.

  1785.  GROSE, A Classical Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue, s.v. FAGGOT the culls, bind the men.

  1859.  G. W. MATSELL, Vocabulum; or, The Rogue’s Lexicon, s.v.

  2.  (venery).—To copulate; also to frequent the company of loose women.