Green’s Dictionary of Slang

to tease, to make fun of; in cite 1843, to accuse.

1589		Lyly Pappe with an Hatchet C2: A craftie iacke, you thoght because you twitted Mar-martin, that none would suspect you.
1594		Lyly Mother Bombie I iii: Twit not me with my ancestors.
1594		R. Barnfield Affectionate Shepheard Diij: Twit no man in the teeth with what th’hast done.
1600		Weakest Goeth to the Wall line 419: Zounds twit me with my trade?
1639		Ford Lady’s Trial II i: Twit me with Dutch! Hang Dutch and French.
1669		R. L’Estrange Fables of Abstemius (1692) CCCII 272: The Woman would be perpetually Twitting of her Second Husband, what a Man her First was. [...] This was Their way of Teizing One-Another.
1675		Head Nugae Venales 34: One twitted the other that he came in at a window by stealth.
1695		Congreve Love for Love II i: What, does he twit me with my wife too?
1706		Fifteen Comforts of Matrimony 4: She now withdraws her Love and Care [...] and twits him of his Slights to her.
1716		R. Wodrow Analecta II (1842) 311: When afterwards the ship sailed, he did not at all loss [sic] his hopes, but used to say to such as twitted him [...] ‘Wait, they are not there as yet!’.
1734		C. Johnson Hist. of Highwaymen &c. 70: My Fellow-Schollars [...] thinking me presumptuous, often twitting me with my Father’s Trade.
1751		W. Kenrick Falstaff’s Wedding (1766) I v: Nay, Sir John, you need not twit me upon that.
1778		Thrale Thraliana i Mar.-Apr. 272: Mr Thrale twitted her with bathing at that End of Brightelmston where the Gentlemen bathed.
1785, 1788, 1796		Grose Classical Dict. of the Vulgar Tongue.
1793		J. O’Keeffe London Hermit (1794) 9: Now I shall be twitted with former favours.
1809		B.H. Malkin (trans.) Adventures of Gil Blas (1822) I 38: He took me to task sharply; twitted me with my low taste.
1815		D. Humphreys Yankey in England 70: I don’t want to be twitted, hectored, and plagued.
1826		Pierce Egan’s Life in London 12 Nov. 750/1: Letitia stated that she and her sister had been drinking [...] and that her sister had ‘twitted’ her about something unpleasant, which provoked her to strike her.
1833		C.A. Davis Letters of Major J. Downing (1835) 87: They will keep jawin’ and twittin’ on us.
1836		T. Haliburton Clockmaker I 243: I guess you needn’t twitt me with out slave-sales, for we deal only in blacks.
1843		Gleaner (Manchester, NH) 29 Apr. n.p.: Fighting with his neighbors, and twiting [sic] them of stealing gold rings.
1844		‘Jonathan Slick’ High Life in N.Y. I 47: She called Judy all sorts of things [...] and twitted her about being poor and setting her cap for me.
1850		J.C. Neal Pic-nic Sketches 30: I never twitted you, uncle.
1856		C. Reade It Is Never Too Late to Mend III 241: Old Merton brought this home and twitted his daughter.
1865		‘Artemus Ward’ Among the Mormons in Complete Works (1922) 309: Colonel O’Grady [...] twits Feeny, the Gov’ment witness, with being a knock-kneed thief.
1868		Sportsman 1 Aug. 4/1: Notes on News [...] ‘I’m sure to be twitted with it [...] on the hustings’.
1878		J. Hatton Cruel London I 184: They twit me now and then with my business.
1879		H. Hartigan Stray Leaves (2nd ser.) 299: On being twitted on the subject, Rory would declare that he was the handsomest of the family!
1886		M.E. Braddon Mohawks III 44: She is a pauper’s nameless brat, foisted upon me by you [...] so that you might be able to twit and laugh at me.
1891		Bird o’ Freedom (Sydney) 7 Feb. 2/2: I didn’t think it was quite fair to twit you of it before folks.
1891		M.D. Landon Eli Perkins: Thirty Years of Wit 142: This made Sinon mad, and he twitted Aristippus with having no children.
1901		‘Miles Franklin’ My Brilliant Career 219: Ladies and gentlemen [...] who knew how to conduct themselves properly, and who paid one every attention without a bit of fear of being twitted with ‘laying the jam on.’.
1902		Bruce Herald (Otago, NZ) 18 July 7: Some men were twitting a son [...] about his father’s exhibition of the white feather.
1910		‘Doss Chiderdoss’ ‘Happy, Though Worried’ Sporting Times 26 Feb. 1/3: I’m unmoved however much the wife may twit me.
1917		‘Henry Handel Richardson’ Aus. Felix (1971) 141: He twitted Sara with her financial affectations, her old-maidish ways.
1928		V. Palmer Passage 164: ‘You old Shylock, Lew,’ she sometimes twitted him.
1939		H. Miller Tropic of Capricorn (1964) 45: My friend Kronski used to twit me about my ‘euphorias.’.
1943		‘Henry Green’ Caught (2001) 99: You said it made no difference, d’you remember, when you were twitting me with going up to that Swedish girl’s flat.
1950		(con. 1936–46) K.S. Prichard Winged Seeds (1984) 117: Seems some of Wally’s cobbers were twitting him about having lost his pretty little dancing partner.
1960		N. Hilliard Maori Girl 225: She twitted her about her huge earrings.
1996		H. Roth From Bondage 209: She chided him for twitting her before company.