subs. (vulgar).—1. Nasal mucus. Hence 2 (common) = a contemptible wretch: also (2) SNOTTER and SNOTTIE = (naval) a midshipman. Whence as verb. = (1) to blow the nose, and (2) to act scurvily; SNOTTERY = filth; SNOTTY = running at the nose, mean, dirty; SNOTTY-NOSED = contemptible, filthy; SNOT-GALL (or SNOTTER) = the nose; SNOT-RAG (SNOTTINGER, or SNOTTER) = (1) a pocket-handkerchief; and (2) the nose (also SNOT- and SNOTTLE-BOX): SNOTTER also = a handkerchief thief; SNOTTER-HAULING = sneaking of WIPES (q.v.); SNOTTED = reprimanded: Fr. mouché.
1599. MARSTON, Scourge of Villanie, ii. To purge the SNOTTERY of our slimie time!
1601. JONSON, The Poetaster, v. 1.
| No, teach thy Incubus to poetize; | |
| And throw abroad thy spurious SNOTTERIES. |
d. 1633. HERBERT, Jacula Prudentum. Better a SNOTTY child than his nose wiped off.
1685. Poor Robin’s Almanack, Three kisses, four Busses, and five licks under the SNOT-GALL.
1691–2. WOOD, Athenæ Oxonienses, ii. The continual importunities of his covetous and SNOTTY wife.
1725. N. BAILEY, trans. The Colloquies of Erasmus, II. 32. Linen rags … retaining still the Marks of the SNOT.
1823. BADCOCK (‘Jon Bee’), Dictionary of the Turf, etc., s.v. WIPE—a pocket-handkerchief…. When this kind of article is in the last stages of consumption they scoff at it, as a SNOTTER.
