sb. Obs. [f. FLAP v. + DRAGON.
The original sense may have been identical with a dialectal sense of snapdragon, viz. a figure of a dragon’s head with snapping jaws, carried about by the mummers at Christmas; but of this there is no trace in our quots.]
1. a. ‘A play in which they catch raisins out of burning brandy and, extinguishing them by closing the mouth, eat them’ (J.); = SNAP-DRAGON. b. A dish of the material used in the game.
1599. B. Jonson, Cynthia’s Rev., V. iii. From stabbing of Armes, Flap-dragons, Healths, Whiffes, and all such swaggering Humors.
1604. Dekker, Honest Wh., xiii. Wks. 1873, II. 83. 2 Mad. Give me that flap-dragon. 3 Mad. Ile not give thee a spoonefull: thou liest, its no Dragon, tis a Parrat, that I bought for my sweet heart, and Ile keepe it.
1622. Fletcher, Beggar’s Bush, V. ii.
| Vand. I’le go afore, and have the bonfire made, | |
| My fireworks, and flap-dragons, and good back-rack. |
c. A raisin or other thing thus caught and eaten.
1588. Shaks., Loves Labour’s Lost, V. i. 45. I maruell thy M. hath not eaten thee for a word, for thou art not so long by the head as honorificabiltudinitatibus: Thou art easier swallowed then a flapdragon.
1599. Massinger, etc., Old Law, III. ii.
| I’d had an eye | |
| Popt out ere this time, or my two butter-teeth | |
| Thrust down my throat instead of a flap-dragon. |
1791–1823. D’Israeli, Cur. Lit. (1866), 287. Such were flap-dragons, which were small combustible bodies fired at one end and floated in a glass of liquor, which an experienced toper swallowed unharmed, while still blazing.
d. As a type of something valueless.
1700. Congreve, Way of World, III. xv. A flap-dragon for your service, Sir!
2. A contemptuous name for a German or Dutchman. Also attrib.
1622. Fletcher, Beggar’s Bush, IV. i.
| You shall not sink for ne’er a sous’d flap-dragon, | |
| For ne’er a pickled pilcher of ’em all, sir. |
1630. J. Taylor (Water P.), Wks., II. 264/2.
| Strait staggers by a Porter, or a Carman, | |
| As bumsie as a fox’d flapdragon German. |
1644. Nest Perfidious Vipers, etc., in Harl. Misc. (Malh.), V. 437. The Commons of England will remember thee, thou Flap-dragon, thou Butter-box; whose Impieties draw, like the powerful Load-stone, speedy Vengeance on thy cursed Head?
3. slang. (See quots.)
a. 1700. B. E., Dict. Cant. Crew, Flap-dragon, a Clap or Pox.
1785. in Grose, Dict. Vulg. Tongue.
Hence Flapdragon. v. (nonce-wd.) trans., to swallow as one would a flap-dragon.
1611. Shaks., Wint. T., III. iii. 100. To make an end of the Ship, to see how the Sea flapdragon’d it.
