subs. phr. (military).—The Seventy-seventh Foot, now the 2nd Batt. Duke of Cambridge’s Own (Middlesex Regiment). [From the resemblance of the two sevens in the old regimental number to pothooks.]
POT-HOOKS AND HANGERS, subs. phr. (colloquial).—1. The elementary characters formed by children when learning to write. Hence, a scrawl, or bad writing.—B. E. (c. 1696); GROSE (1785). [Cf. FLESH-HOOKS (c. 1321, Reliquiæ Antiquæ, i.) = notes of music.]
1690. DRYDEN, Don Sebastian, ii. 2. I long to be spelling her Arabic scrawls and POT-HOOKS.
1772. BRIDGES, A Burlesque Translation of Homer, 469.
| If ever … I such a pack of POT-HOOKS saw. | |
| What language does he write? |
1821. P. EGAN, Life in London, II. v. Whose to understand it? Vy it’s full of POTHOOKS AND HANGERS.
2. (old).—Shorthand.
