Green’s Dictionary of Slang

a chamberpot.

c.1386		Chaucer Words of the Host to Physician and Pardoner line 304: I pray to god, to saue thy gentil cors, And eek thyne urinals and thy Iordanes.
1526		C Mery Talys 15: I wot wel a iordayn & a pyſpot is all one.
1540		D. Lyndsay Satyre of Thrie Estaits III vii: Ryiss up, Lowry, ye luik even lyk a lurdane, Your mowth war meit to drink owt ane wensche jurdane.
1592		Greene Blacke Bookes Messenger 29: And so pluckt goodman Iurdaine with all his contents down pat on the Curbers pate.
c.1597		Shakespeare Henry IV Pt 1 II i: Why, they will allow us ne’er a jordan, and then we leak in the chimney.
1614		Jonson Bartholomew Fair IV iv: Pre dee now, shweet Ursh, help dis good brave voman to a jordan.
1628		J. Earle Micro-Cosmographie D2: The Tauerne [...] After a long sitting [...] the Iordans like swelling rivers ouerflow.
1632		R. Brome Covent-Garden Weeded II i: Carry up a Jordan for the Maidenhead, and a quart of white muskadine for the blew Bore.
1654		Witts Recreations ‘Fancies & Fantasticks’ No. 115: If their brains be not well, / Or bladders doe swell, [...] My Lady will come / With a bowl and a broom, / And their handmaid with a Jourden.
1667		Poor Robin’s jests 133: Why (quoth the Servingman) pray what difference is there betwixt a Piss-pot and a Jordan?
1677		G. Miege A new dictionary French and English n.p.: A JORDAN, or Chamber-pot, pot de chambre.
1682		A. Radcliffe ‘Call to the Guard’ in Dryden Miscellaneous Poems (1716) 104: Of some Scars by the Jordan, or warlike Quart Pot.
1684		The tongue combatants 4: [A]ccomodated with [...] some Cleane-pipes and a jordin.
1696		D’Urfey Comical Hist. of Don Quixote Pt 3 V i: Thou Jordan of foul Juice, thou hast undone me.
c.1698		B.E. Dict. Canting Crew n.p.: Jordain, c. [...] a Chamberpot.
1725		New Canting Dict. [as cit. c.1698].
1728		Pope Dunciad II 23: This China-Jordan, let the chief o’ercome Replenish, not ingloriously, at home. [Ibid.] 24: Crown’d with the Jordan, walks contented home .
1737, 1759, 1760, 1776		Bailey Universal Etym. Eng. Dict. [as cit. c.1698].
1751		Smollett Peregrine Pickle (1964) 305: As for that thick-headed, insolent pedant, his confederate, who emptied my own jordan upon me while I slept.
1765		O. Goldsmith Essays 1: Instead of a crown, our performer covered his brows with an inverted jordan [F&H].
1770		D. Gunston (ed.) Jemmy Twitcher’s Jests 82: She to the jordan went to p—s.
1785, 1788, 1796		Grose Classical Dict. of the Vulgar Tongue.
c.1785		‘An Unfortunate Woman of the Town’ in A. Carpenter Verse in Eng. in 18C Ireland (1998) 411: A broken Jordan, and a three-legg’d Chair.
1791		J. Gillray 1 Nov. [cartoon title] Lubber’s Hole, – alias – The Crack’d Jordan.
1798		‘Answer to Captain Morris’ in Hilaria 77: And a jordan, perhaps, on your noddle may split, / So before you get home, you’re bepiss’d or be-sh-t!
1803		‘C. Caustic’ Petition Against Tractorising Trumpery 91: And e’en old women bravely wield Their jordans like Achilles’ shield.
1811		Lex. Balatronicum.
1823		‘Jon Bee’ Dict. of the Turf, the Ring, the Chase, etc.
1830		Little Cocky-Bendy 1: He oft was with a jordan crown’d! / And with it’s fluid almost drowned!
1842		Whip and Satirist of NY 9 Apr. n.p.: Man was not intended by nature to twirl mops and empty jordans.
1846		Swell’s Night Guide 73: Times are badly changed since John the hostler lived here; then every bed had a jordan; but now you must leak in a chimney corner.
1859, 1860		Hotten Dict. of Modern Sl. etc.
1873		Sl. Dict.
1887		Brewer in N&Q III 79: We always called the Matula the jordan, and into this receptacle all the bedroom slops were emptied [F&H].
1957		G. Kersh Fowlers End (2001) 133: I didn’t know where the lav was, but luckily there seems to be a jordan under the bed.
1974		P. Larkin ‘Livings’ High Windows 15: Our butler Starveling piles the logs / And sets behind the screens a jordan / (Quicker than going to the bogs).