Pox

subs. (old).—Syphilis: sometimes qualified as FRENCH- (ITALIAN-, GERMAN-, or INDIAN-) POX, for which, and other synonyms, see FRENCH-GOUT and LADIES’-FEVER. Whence, verb. = to syphilize; and POCKY, or POCKIFIED (adj.) = syphilized. Used vulgarly and popularly as a petty oath or common malison (e.g., POX! POX ON’T! POX TAKE YOU! WHAT A POX! WITH A POX! &c.: see the Elizabethan drama passim). Hence POXTER = a syphilist; POXOPHOLIT = an opponent of the Contagious Diseases Acts; POXOLOGY = the study of SIPH. (q.v.); and POXOLOGIST = a pox-doctor, a SIPHOPHIL (q.v.).—B. E. (c. 1696); GROSE (1785). [Originally and occasionally as in quots. 1594 and 1631, the small-pox; but for some three centuries specialized as above.] See HORSE-POX.

  1522–3.  SKELTON, Why come ye nat to Courte? 1167.

  1528.  ROY and BARLOW, Rede me and be nott wrothe [Harleian Miscellany [PARK], IX., 32].

  1600.  The Weakest goeth to the Wall, i. 2. These Frenchmen’s feet have a POCKY strong scent.

  1588.  J. LYLY, Endimion, iv. 1. A POXE of all false proverbs.

  1594.  SHAKESPEARE, Love’s Labour’s Lost, v. 2. Ros. O that your face were not so full of O’s! Kath. A POX of that jest! Ibid. (1598), 2 Henry IV., i. 2. A man can no more separate age and covetousness than a’ can part young limbs and lechery: but the gout galls the one, and the POX pinches the other…. A POX of this gout! or, a gout of this POX! for the one or the other plays the rogue with my great toe. Ibid. (1609) Pericles, iv. 6. Pand. Now a POX on her green sickness for me. Bawd. Faith there’s no way to be rid on’t, but by the way to the POX.

  1598.  FLORIO, A Worlde of Wordes, s.v. Varolare, to infect, or to be infected with the POXE. Ibid., Varole, the GREAT or FRENCH POXE. Ibid., Varoloso, POCKIE, full of the POXE, botches, or blanes.

  1597.  JOSEPH HALL, Virgidemiarum, III. i.

  1599.  JONSON, Every Man out of his Humour, iv. 4. Carlo. Let a man sweat once a week in a hot-house and be well rubbed and froted, with a good plump juicy wench, and sweet linen, he shall ne’er have the POX. Punt. What, the FRENCH POX? Car. The FRENCH POX! our POX: we have them in as good a form as they. What?

  1605.  CHAPMAN, All Fools, iii. 1. Da. I know a doctor of your name, master POCK. Po. My name has made many doctors, sir.

  1613.  WEBSTER, The Devil’s Law-case, ii. 1.

  1619.  FLETCHER, The Humourous Lieutenant, i. 2. Celia. POX on these bawling drums! I’m sure you’ll kiss me.

  1631.  MASSINGER, The Emperor of the East, iv. 4.

  d. 1631.  DONNE, Letters [NARES]. At my return from Kent, I found Peggy had the POXE—I humbly thank God it has not much disfigured her.

  1653.  URQUHART, Rabelais, I. xiv. Let me be peppered with the POX if you find not all your wives with child at your return … for the very shadow … of an abbey is fruitful.

  1662.  Rump Songs, i. 28.

  1668.  ETHEREGE, She Would if She Could, i. 1. Sir Oliv. Well, a POX of this tying men and women together, for better or worse. Ibid., iii. 2. Sir John. A POX UPON these qualms.

  1675.  WYCHERLEY, The Country Wife, i. 1. A POX ON’T! the jades would jilt me. Ibid., ii. 1. Mrs. Pinch. He says he won’t let me go abroad for fear of catching the POX. Alitha. Fy! The small POX, you should say.

  d. 1680.  ROCHESTER, Works, 63.

  d. 1680.  BUTLER, Dildoides.

  1680.  EARL OF DORSET, Poems, ‘On the Countess of Dorchester.’ Can’st thou forget thy age and POX? Ibid. (1686), A Faithful Catalogue of our Most Eminent Ninnies. With Face and Cunt all martyred with the POX. Ibid. Thou wondrous POCKY art, and wondrous poor.

  1682.  A. RADCLIFFE, The Ramble, 88.

  16[?].  T. BROWN, Horace, I. xxvii. What a POX should we fight for? Ibid. The arms of a POCKIFIED whore.

  1693.  CONGREVE, The Old Bachelor, iii. 6. The POX light upon thee for a contemplative pimp. Ibid (1694), The Double Dealer, iii. 3. POX, I have lost all appetite to her; yet she’s a fine woman.

  1693.  URQUHART, Rabelais, III. Prol. As for Hypocrites, much less; altho’ they were all of them unsound in Body, POCKIFY’D, scurfie, furnish’d with unquenchable Thirst.

  1697.  VANBRUGH, The Provoked Wife, ii. 1. Heart. Why, there’s no division, I hope. Sir John. No; but there’s a conjunction: and that’s worse. A POX O’ the parson.

  1705.  HEARNE, Diary, 17 Nov. The duke of Buckingham … whilst he was there [Spain] happened to receive a POX, by lying with a Spanish beauty … so violent that he could not rid himself of it before he was obliged to return to England.

  1706.  WARD, The Wooden World Dissected, 9. He epicurizes his POCKY Carcass for ever after. Ibid., 45. One POCKY Whore brings the Surgeon more grist in than a thousand French cannon. Ibid., 67. A POX ON it, cries he.

  1714.  POPE, The Rape of the Lock, iv. 128.

  1772.  BRIDGES, A Burlesque Translation of Homer, 12. Pray, WHO THE POX made you a witch?