subs. (colloquial).1. Obscenity; ribaldry. Hence SMUTTY = lewd, obscene, NUTTY (q.v.); SMUTTINESS = bawdry (B. E. and GROSE).
1698. COLLIER, A Short View of the Immorality and Profaneness of the English Stage, 6. SMUTTINESS is a Fault in Behaviour as well as in Religion. Ibid., 24. There are no SMUTTY Songs in their Plays, in which the English are extremely Scandalous.
d. 1704. T. BROWN, Works, i. 237. The Judge gravely tells them, Look ye, Ladies we have a SMUTTY Trial coming on yet the Devil a Lady will flinch. for the Business.
1709. WARD, London Terræfilius, 2. 12 [Works (1709), i.] She has as many SMUTTY stories at her tongues end as an old parish clerk.
d. 1719. ADDISON, The Lover, xix. He will talk SMUT, though a priest and his mother be in the room.
1722. STEELE, The Conscious Lovers, Prologue. Another SMUTS his scene.
1734. POPE, Satires, Prologue, 322. Or spite, or SMUT, or rhymes, or blasphemies.
1746. SMOLLETT, Advice, 172. The SMUTTY joke, ridiculously lewd.
1857. Punch, 31 Jan., 40, Dear Bill, This Stone-Jug.
But the lark s when a goney up with us they shut, | |
As aint up to our lurks, our flash-patter and SMUT. |
2. (various).(a) A copper boiler (GROSE, VAUX, and HOTTEN); (b) = a grate (GROSE; in VAUX = a furnace); (c) = old iron (GROSE).
See BROTHER SMUT.