or younker, younkerkin, etc., subs. (old).—1. A lad, a young person: always more or less familiar, contemptuous, or colloquial. Also (2) a novice, an inexperienced youth, and (nautical) a raw hand; in modern naval usage = a junior officer. [SMYTH-PALMER (s.v. YOUNGSTER): No doubt a corrupt form of YOUNKER, orig. (Germ.) a title of honour. TRENCH: The first example of YOUNGSTER which Richardson gives us is from the Spectator [No. 324]. If it exists at all in our earlier literature, it will hardly be otherwise than as the female correlative of the male younker or ‘yonker,’ a word of constant recurrence. Contrariwise, see quot. 1593; it is probably late Tudor, having birth at a time when it had been forgotten that the termination -ster was originally feminine only.] Hence to make a YOUNKER of one = to gull, cheat, deceive (for an innocent).
[1502–9. Letters of Richard III. and Henry VII. (GARDNER). We see the Dutch title of honour, YONKER.]
1530. PALSGRAVE, Langue Francoyse, s.v. Ung rustre [an uncouth rustic, but note similarity to YOUNGSTER], YONKER.
c. 1530. Christes Kirk on the Green [T. L. KINGTON-OLIPHANT, The New English, i. 467. YOUNKER … did not come in long before that year.]
1562. BULLEYN, Booke of Simples, xxviii. verso. If there be any YONKERS troubled with idelnesse and loytryng.
1584. HOLINSHED, Conquest of Ireland. Such young novices and YONKERS as are of late gone thither.
1593. Tom Tel-Troth’s Message, 601.
| This trull makes YOUNGSTERS spend their patrimonie | |
| In sauced meates and sugred delicates. |
1594. BARNFIELD, Helens Rape.
| Yet such sheep he kept, and was so seemelie a shepheard, | |
| Seemelie a Boy, so seemelie a youth, so seemelie a YOUNKER, | |
| That on Ide was not such a Boy, such a youth, such a YOUNKER. |
1594. R. GREENE, Friar Bacon and Friar Bungay, 175.
| Now lusty YOUNKERS, look within the glass, | |
| And tell me if you can discern your sires. |
1595. SHAKESPEARE, 3 Henry VI., ii. 1.
| How well resembles it the prime of youth, | |
| Trimm’d like a YONKER, prancing to his love! | |
| Ibid. (1598), Merchant of Venice, ii. 6. | |
| How, like a YOUNKER, and a prodigal, | |
| The skarfed bark puts from her native bay. | |
| Ibid. (1598), 1 Henry IV., iii. 3. | |
| What, will you make a YOUNKER of me? Shall I not take mine ease in mine inn, but I must have my pocket picked for it? |
1596. SPENSER, The Fairie Queene, IV. i. 10–11.
| Amongst the rest there was a jolly Knight … | |
| But that same YOUNKER soone was overthrowne. |
1599. JOSEPH HALL, Satires, III. v. 18. There must my YONKER fetch his waxen crowne.
1607. DEKKER, Northward Hoe, iv. 1. If I were a YOUNKER, it would be no immodesty … to be seen in my company; but to have snow in the lap of June, vile, vile!
1614. CHAPMAN, Odyssey, xiv. 747.
| But while Ulysses slept there, and close by | |
| The other YOUNKERS, he abroad would lie. |
c. 1625. FLETCHER, The Elder Brother, iii. 5. Would he were buried! I fear he’ll make an ass of me, a YOUNKER.
1626. CAPT. JOHN SMITH, English Sea Terms, s.v. Sayler [an old hand as opposed to] YOUNKER, a fore-mast man.
1630–40. HOWELL, Familiar Letters, I. vi. 4. There was a Parliament then at Rheinsburgh, where all the YOUNKERS met.
1647–8. HERRICK, Hesperides, ‘Upon Pagget.’ This YONKER fierce to fight.
1670. COTTON, Burlesque upon Burlesque: or, The Scoffer Scofft [Works (1725), 249].
| He is a very honest YOUNKER, | |
| A bonny Lad, and a great Punker. |
d. 1684. OLDHAM, Satires, 223.
| The credit of the business and the state | |
| Are things that in a YOUNGSTER’S sense sound great. |
1706. WARD, The Wooden World Dissected, 24. A hundred or two of these little YOUNKERS, with which he could fight better than with so many stout Tars in an Engagement.
1772. BRIDGES, A Burlesque Translation of Homer, 137. As smooth as YOUNKERS slide on ice.
1809. MALKIN, Gil Blas [ROUTLEDGE], 31. By all that is sacred … it is plain you are no YOUNKER.
1822. LAMB, The Essays of Elia, ‘The Praise of Chimney-Sweepers.’ O it was a pleasure to see the sable YOUNKERS lick in the unctuous meat.
1870. JUDD, Margaret, i. vi. The juveniles and YOUNKERS in the town.
