Brummagem adj.
cheap, second-rate, fake.
 | Calendar Dom. St Papers 105: Those swords which he... pretends to be blades of his owne makeing are all Bromedgham blades and forraine blades [F&H]. | |
![[UK]](/static/img/flags/uk.png "United Kingdom") | Fifteen Real Comforts of Matrimony 38: Tis a greater discomfort to him to see his Daughter return’d upon his hands, like a Bromigham-groat. | |
| Commonwealth of Women I i: A Brummingham son of a wh–, affront the Noble Admiral! [F&H]. | |
| Dict. Canting Crew n.p.: Bromigham-conscience, very bad; Bromigham-protestants, Dissenters or Whiggs. | |
| Burlesque Homer (3rd edn) 434: None of your Birmingham affairs, / Nor any such-like shabrag wares. | |
![[Ind]](/static/img/flags/ind.png "India") | Hicky’s Bengal Gaz. 23-30 June n.p.: The Presumptuous Pulta Rotas (the Copper smith) commonly call’d the Bermingham Counterfeit . | |
| Burlesque Homer (4th edn) II 254: [as cit. 1772]. | |
| Spectre Knight 12: If you attempt to be coming over this young woman wid any of your Brummajem blarney, perhaps I may be under the necessity of giving you a rap. | |
| Berkshire Chron. 10 Jan. 3/4: A city article in the Brummangem line. | |
| Turpin’s Ride to York II i: It’s real Brummagum; I gave one shilling and sixpence for it. | |
| Spitalfields Weaver I ii: Is that all the fashion? them shoes, like Brummagen japanned candlesticks. | |
| Oddities of London Life II 275: walker, a girlish-looking lad, with hair nicely parted and curled on both sides, splendidly adorned with ‘Brummagem’ jewellery. | |
![[US]](/static/img/flags/us.png "United States") | Letter-bag of the Great Western (1873) 7: It is all Brummigem now – all cheap and dirty, like its coaches – bah! | |
![[Ire]](/static/img/flags/ire.png "Ireland") | Handy Andy 181: Miss Riley gave a reproachful look and shrug at the vulgar mention of a ‘fi’penny bit’, which Murphy purposely said to shock her ‘Brummagem gentility’. | |
| Memoirs of a Griffin II 226: The Brummagem swords of the troopers would make little or no impression on the quilted jackets and vests of the Mahrattas. | |
![[Aus]](/static/img/flags/aus.png "Australia") | Bell’s Life in Sydney 12 Feb. 2/7: [He] had a pretty little assortment of ‘Brummagem gold.’ It had been electrotyped and felt tolerably ponderous when put together in a dirty leather pouch. | |
| Ask Mamma 253: The bulk of his plate was ‘Brummagem’ ware – and not silver. | |
| Tom Brown at Oxford (1880) 100: It gave me a turn to hear you translating ‘Punica fides’ into Brummagem wares just now. | |
| Dick Temple I 244: ‘Flashing’ the Brummagem jewellery which adorned their thievish fingers. | |
| Bulletin (Sydney) 24 Apr. 4/4: Brummagem metal must at lat, What’ere betide, itself assert. | |
| Secrets of Tramp Life Revealed 13: They are called ‘Pitchers.’ They have a mode of living by standing at street corners [...] and will have for sale what they call ‘Brummagem Balls,’ which are only whitening and a little Venetian red to colour it. | |
| Signor Lippo 92: It was Brommagem swag she grafted, you bet. | |
| Truth (Sydney) 7 Jan. 2/2: Reid [...] described the ministry as ‘a band of political larrikins’ and Dibbs as a ‘Brummagem Dictator’. | |
| Mingled Yarn 77: [T]here was time [...] to visit the cinnamon gardens, to bargain for Brummagem jewellery and native curios with the aborigines. | |
| Truth (Sydney) 23 Aug. 3/3: Durban I finds fairly lively / One long street made up of shops / Of the Waster sort, a-vendin’ / Brummum things and German slops. | |
| ‘Aus. Engineers’ in Roderick (1967–9) II 93: With the cardboard boots for our leather, and the Brummagen goods, and the slops. | |
| City Of The World 274: He’s got to know whether his toy and tackle is a real clock and slang or only a measly Brummagem fake. | |
| Truth (Sydney) 13 Oct. 9/8: He had been convicted for selling brummagem jewellery once. | |
| ‘All That Glitters’ in Polished Ebony 14: The brummagem brilliance of the ultimate selection allayed [...] the doubts which clung, fungus-like [etc]. | |
| Big Red 10: The brummagen candelabrum [...] was shattered. |
In compounds
1. a counterfeit coin; occas. a genuine shilling .
| Durham Co. Advertiser 6 Jan. 5/3: Electors were seen exultantly wacing their bank-notes in the air, jingling sovereigns in their hands, exclaiming, ‘Here’s your Brummagem buttons without shanks!’. | |
| Dublin Eve. Packet 9 Aug. 4/5: My gleanings there amounted to the mighty aggregate of twelvepence halfpenny, including two Brummagem buttons. | |
| Pickwick Papers (1999) 25: Bad silver — Brummagem buttons — won’t do — no go — eh? | |
| Dublin Monitor 24 Apr. 2/3: A frieze coat and a Brummagem button have superseded intrinsic worth. | |
| Medical Times Feb. 20-Oct. 9597/3: Having a titlepage which looks exceedingly like a quack advertisement, and a number of questions on the first leaf that have all the characteristics of a ‘Brummagem button’. | |
| Leicester Mercury 24 Sept. 8/4: Those who could nott afford, might drop in a ‘Brummagem button’ as it would make a noise. | |
| Sportsman 9 Sept. 6/1: The shire of Brummagem buttons and Waterloo relics [...] boasts most excellent shooting, hunting and coursing. | |
| Sat. Rev. (London) Nov. 661: They [Brummagem buttons] were marvellously inexpensive, and being such ingenious imitations of the spade guineas and half-guineas then current that many Englishmen might have failed to detect the difference [...] [F&H]. |
2. a native of Birmingham.
| Eddowes’s Jrnl 2 July 1/7: William Hutton, of Birmingham, was an ungilt Brummagem button, but a man of strong native powers of mind. | |
| Rides on Railways 81: ‘A Brummagem Button’ is the old-fashioned nickname for a Birmingham workman. | |
| Folk-Phrases of Four Counties 5: A Brummagem button. A young man of Birmingham. | |
| Birmingham Mail 29 Dec. 2: From Ross, Nellie, and Elsie, 3s; A former Brummagem Button, 2s 6d; E.R., 2s [etc]. | |
| Hastings & St Leonards Obs. 31 May 6/2: City of Birmingham and its coming association with Hastings. By ‘A Brummagem Button’. | |
| Western Morn. News 12 Aug. 8/6: The ‘Brummagem Button’ wins [...] by such bluff as these sons of the Midlands have so often proved. |
a very bad conscience.
| Dict. Canting Crew n.p.: Bromigham-conscience, very bad. | |
| Oxford Chron. 12 Nov. 5/3: It is a very Brummagem jind of conscience [...] first to take a man’s money [...] and then go into court and [...] hand hi over to the enemy. | |
| Burnley Advertiser 2 Mar. 3/8: Bible-teaching the Brummagem conscience ignores. |
counterfeit coins manufactured in Birmingham.
| Dict. Archaic and Provincial Words I 213/1: Bromidgham. A corruption of Birmingham. A Bromidgham groat, a spurious fourpennypiece. A person neither Whig nor Tory, but between both, was called a Bromidgham. |
(Aus.) a sum of money that is desired but never paid.
| Port Augusta Dispatch (SA) 5 Aug. 3/2: I don’t suppose the rev. plaintiff ever heard of a Brummagem half-penny — ‘a ha’penny’ on one side, and ‘don’t you wish you may get it’ on the other. |
Whigs or Dissenters.
| Dict. Canting Crew n.p.: Bromigham-Protestants, Dissenters or Whiggs. | |
| Royal Cornwall Gaz. 27 Apr. 6/3: I will not march in her heroic ranks of cheap and sham martyrs, twopenny halfpenny patriots, and Brummagem protestants. |
used of a person, an insult.
| Satirist (London) 19 June 192/1: Although he was told he'd no right to be there. Was insulted, and called filthy ‘Brummagem Ware’. |
any adulterated or mixed drink.
| Dict. Canting Crew n.p.: Bromigham-wine, Balderdash, Sophisticate Taplash. | |
| Aris’s Birmingham gaz. 5 Sept. 3/7: Extraordinary Investigation. ‘Brummagem’ Port Wine, alias Cider, Pontac, and British Brandy [...] investigated at the Birmingham Police office. |