Green’s Dictionary of Slang

(Irish) by God!

1696		D. Manley Lost Lover I i: l. young: Where ave you been since dinner? sir rustick: Be dad taking a Glass to this pretty Lady’s health. [Ibid.] III ii: I have bin telling her, how eager all the young Fellows will be of hitting the Bride in the Face; but be-dad, I hope I shall hit her better somewhere else.
1721		Penkethman’s Jests 33: Why, B---d, My liege, the Clock struck first.
1839		Wexford Indep. 20 Mar. 4/1: Bedad! there isn’t a boy in the barony would hate the bailiffs wid greater joy than myself!
1843		Bellew Memoirs of a Griffin II 213: ‘Oh! then, by dad, you must forgive me’.
1844		C.J. Lever Tom Burke of ‘Ours’ II 245: ‘You are a wit, Mr. M’Keown, I fancy – eh?’ ‘Bedad I’m not sir.’.
1847		[A. Harris] (con. 1820s) Settlers & Convicts 318: Be-dad, I could almost eat a jackass raw.
1852		G.C. Mundy Our Antipodes III 90: Oh! bedad, his word’s law in that house!
1858		Vermont Watchman (Montpelier, VT) 26 Feb. 4/3: ‘Bedad, I guess they’re in safe keeping now!’.
1865		‘Tim Finigan’s Wake’ in I. Beadle Comic and Sentimental Song Bk 61: Bedad! he revives! See how he raises!
1872		‘Going to Vote for Greeley’ in Farmer of Chappaqua Songster 23: Isn’t he the splendid Farmer, / Just like one of us, bedad!
1874		‘Old Calabar’ Won in a Canter I 70: ‘Bedad, you’re out there, Mat’.
1879		H. Hartigan Stray Leaves (2nd ser.) 134: ‘Is it the captain you mane?’ [...] ‘Bedad it is’.
1882		Bristol Magpie 14 Dec. 11/1: ‘Bedad, Freddy ye’ll have to find the tenements’.
1885		Bulletin (Sydney) 11 July 12/2: Mr. Terence Leonidas Murphy, who was following him up the ladder, remarked, casually: ‘Bedad, that’s the hivviest load of brick that Oi iver car’d, bedad, so it is!’.
1890		Sporting Times 1 Feb. 2/1: ‘Oh! Bejasus,’ sez he, ‘and begorrah and bedad; phwat have you got yourself up like a Faynian image for?’.
1894		Truth (Sydney) 3 June 2/1: Oi read [...] that watered velvet was the latest thing, bedad.
1895		E. Townsend Chimmie Fadden Explains 76: Shure, whin our daily work is o’er, / Bedad, our bones is tired and sore.
1901		Boy’s Own Paper 4 May 484: Bedad I could afford to laugh wid the best av thim.
1906		W. Boyle Eloquent Dempsy (1911) Act I: dempsy: Gentlemen, I am always open on this drinking question. a voice: Bedad, you are!
1907		Lone Hand (Sydney) July 233/1: ‘It was the Divil of a night, but, bedad! itis a jewel of a day’.
1916		Joyce Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man 27: We got a good breath of ozone round the Head to-day. Ay, bedad.
1916		‘Sapper’ Men, Women & Guns 38: ‘If there’ a gun in that wood, bedad! we’ll gun it’.
1928		L. Mackay My Oul’ Town 17: ‘You’ll be late for Mass, Mike.’ ‘Bedad,’ sis Mike.
1938		X. Herbert Capricornia (1939) 202: Bedad, man dear, they’d be gettin’ sweet but-all if I didn’t!
1948		P. Kavanagh Tarry Flynn (1965) 94: Bedad, there’s someone coming in from the Big Road.
1953		B. Behan Scarperer (1966) 14: Bedad and he has the heart crossways in you.
1961		‘Flann O’Brien’ Hard Life 7: Be the dad, Mr Hanafin said smiling, Marius will be delighted.
1962		B. Behan Brendan Behan’s Island (1984) 97: I do, bedad.
1970		C. Brown Down All the Days (1990) 76: Aye, with the Chief himself, bedad, and all the boys.
1982		(con. 1930s–50s) E. Mac Thomáis Janey Mack, Me Shirt is Black 90: Have yis forgotten when we Jackeens saved the harvest for yis? Bedad we did.
1996		D. Healy Bend for Home 86: See that lake? [...] There was a race-course here, if you can believe it, and bedad he fell in and drowned.