[a. F. lampon, recorded from 17th c.; the vb. + lamponner, to ridicule, is cited from Brantôme (died 1614).
The Fr. etymologists regard the sb. as f. lampons ‘let us drink,’ imperative of lamper (slang) to booze, guzzle.]
A virulent or scurrilous satire upon an individual.
1645. Evelyn, Mem. (1857), I. 174. Here they still paste up their drolling lampoons and scurrilous papers.
1689. Shadwell, Bury F., I. i. I pepper’d the Court with libels and Lampoons.
a. 1704. T. Brown, Pindar. Petit. Lds. Council, Wks. 1730, I. 61. Should you order Tho. Brown, To be whipp’d thro’ the town, For scurvy lampoon.
1779–81. Johnson, L. P., Pope, Wks. IV. 3. On his master at Twyford he had already exercised his poetry in a lampoon.
1830. D’Israeli, Chas I., III. vii. 153. This circumstance only appeared by two bitter lampoons in the works of Jonson.
1842. De Quincey, Pagan Oracles, Wks. 1858, VIII. 172. The rancorous lampoons of Gregory Nazianzen against his sovereign.
1872. Minto, Eng. Prose Lit., I. ii. 145. Taking the lampoons of the time as documents of literal fidelity.
Comb. 1721. Strype, Eccl. Mem., II. vii. 54. Among the rest [of the ballads] there was published a very unlucky one, lampoon-wise … pretending to take the part of the papists against the preachers.
