▪ I. pox, n.
(pɒks)
[An altered spelling of pocks, pl. of pock n., used collectively as name of a disease (cf. measles, mumps, rickets, etc.), and at length as a singular.]
1. Name for several different diseases characterized by ‘pocks’ or eruptive pustules on the skin: see pock n. 2 a. a. Undefined. (Usually = e (b) or designating any venereal disease.) Now only colloq.
| [c 1325, etc.: see pock n. 2 α.] 1550 Bale Image Both Ch. ii. xvii. S iv, Here were muche to be spoken of..saint Iobe for y⊇ pox, saint Fyacre for ague. 1604 E. G[rimstone] D'Acosta's Hist. Indies iii. xxii. 187 There is much of that wood which they call Lignum sanctum,..fit to cure the pox. 1684 tr. Bonet's Merc. Compit. x. 356 Treacle is the best Alexiterick against the Pox. 1726 Swift Gulliver iv. x, Here were no..fops, bullies, drunkards, strolling whores, or poxes. 1763 Churchill Duellist iii. 380 In turn to give a Pox, or take it. 1856 Emerson Eng. Traits, First Visit Wks. (Bohn) II. 5 He [Coleridge] said..there were only three things which the government had brought into that garden of delights [Sicily], namely, itch, pox, and famine. 1922 [see lock n.2 18]. 1930 Amer. Speech V. 392 Pox, any kind of venereal disease. 1930 Brophy & Partridge Songs & Slang 1914–18 88 But now she's standing in the gutter, selling matches penny-a-box: While he's riding in his carriage With an awful dose of—[awful dose of pox in 1965 ― Long Trail 70]. 1968 [see dose n. 2 d]. 1969 Coast to Coast 1967–68 191 ‘Yah! Luther stinking swine! He had the pox!’ Simon..had yelled in return ‘Old bugger Pope pokes the nuns!’ 1976 J. O'Connor Eleventh Commandment viii. 101 Wally..strangled a prostitute for giving him a dose of the pox. 1977 Sounds 9 July 8/4 It's still potent diz bustin' rhinostomp, a most touching lament to the pox, but it's not brash to an offensive level. |
† b. = small-pox.
Obs.| 1621 F. Davison Poems Canzonet xlvi. 143 Vpon his Ladies sickenesse of the Poxe [ed. 1602 Sicknesse of the Small Pockes]. 1650 in H. Cary Mem. Gt. Civ. War (1832) II. 248 My lord's sizer and Mr. Adam's are sick of the pox; it is thought past the worst. 1685 J. Cooke Marrow Chirurg. vi. ii. ix. (ed. 4) 215 Their drink all the Time until the Pox begins to dye, and after..may be Small-Beer, warm at pleasure. 1819 Byron Juan i. cxxix, The Doctor paid off an old pox By borrowing a new one from an ox. |
c. Some disease of sheep. ?
Obs.| [1531: see pock n. 3.] 1545 Elyot, Mentigo, the scabbe whiche is amonge shepe called the poxe. 1607 Topsell Four-f. Beasts (1658) 476 The Holy Fire which the Shepheards call the Pox, or the Blisters, or Saint Anthonies fire. |
d. Local name for a rash or eruption to which workers in antimony are liable.
| 1897 Allbutt's Syst. Med. II. 942 This eruption which is called by the [antimony] workmen the ‘pox’, occurs where the skin perspires most freely. Ibid. 944 For the skin-eruption or ‘pox’ as it is called.. sponging with a solution of bicarbonate or biborate of soda..is generally sufficient to give relief. |
e. With qualifying words: (
a) See
chicken-pox,
cow-pox,
small-pox,
swine-pox; (
b)
great pox,
French pox, or
Spanish pox, syphilis.
| 1503 Frenche pox [see French A. 6]. 1529 in Ld. Herbert Hen. VIII (1649) 267 The foule, and contagious Disease of the Great Pox. 1584 R. Scot Discov. Witchcr. i. ii. (1886) 5 Our neighbours..doubted that he had the French pox. 1608 Topsell Serpents (1658) 616 Ointments that are prepared against the French or Spanish pox. 1731 Swift Cassinus & Peter 48 Say, has the small or greater pox Sunk down her nose, or seam'd her face? 1819 Byron Juan i. cxxx, I said the small-pox has gone out of late; Perhaps it may be followed by the great. |
† 2. In
pl. sense
= pocks, pustules of small-pox.
| c 1672–1813 [see small-pox]. 1719 T. Boston Mem. (1899) 344 Jane was taken ill of the small pox... Her pox were many, and of a dangerous kind. |
3. In imprecations, or exclamations of irritation or impatience.
Cf. plague n. 3 d.
arch. (chiefly
Lit.)
| 1588 Shakes. L.L.L. v. ii. 46 A Pox of that iest, and I beshrew all Shrowes. 1589 Pappe w. Hatchet B ij b, A pockes of that religion. 1601 Shakes. All's Well iv. iii. 307 A pox on him, he's a Cat still. 1647 Clarendon Hist. Reb. iv. §187 Some said, ‘a Pox take the House of Commons, let them be Hanged’. 1695 Congreve Love for L. v. iv, O Pox, how shall I get rid of this foolish Girl? 1710 S. Centlivre Bickerstaff's Burying 7 What a-pox, she wont die for the Man she hates. 1749 Fielding Tom Jones vii. vi, Formalities! with a pox! pooh, all stuff and nonsense! 1793 Wolcott (P. Pindar) Pindariana Wks. 1812 IV. 163 A pox on all sorrow! 1820 Mair Lat. Dict. 415 Væ! Vah! wo! pox on't. 1922 Joyce Ulysses 392 But they can go hang..for me with their bully beef, a pox on it. 1941 V. Woolf Between Acts 126 Hand me the mirror, girl. So. Now my wig... A pox on the girl—she's dreaming! 1963 Sunday Times 8 Sept. 29/3 Cool Shakespeare thrives in the sixth and phrases like ‘Pox on't!’ and ‘Fie!’ are in present usage. 1973 ‘A. Hall’ Tango Briefing xiv. 184 A pox on his grave repercussions, if he meant the whole thing'd blow up..why couldn't he bloody well say so. |
4. Comb.:
poxfiend;
pox-doctor slang, a doctor specializing in the treatment of venereal diseases;
phr. got up like a pox-doctor's clerk (and
varr.), dressed smartly but in bad taste, overdressed;
pox-fouled a., infected with syphilis;
pox-rotten a., physically corrupted by syphilis;
pox-stone = pock-stone: see
pock n. 4.
| 1937 D. Jones In Parenthesis v. 118 You feel the pack of the Ox-blood Kid—it's as light as the Rig'mentals—there's a whole lot of them that work it: the *Pox-Doctor's Clerk, for one, the chitties, and types of scullion bummers up. 1949 Partridge Dict. Slang (ed. 3) 1141/2 Pox doctor's clerk, like—or got-up like—a, in a very smart civilian suit: Naval: C. 20. 1965 E. Lambert Long White Night xv. 136 They was all dressed like they was at Buckingham Palace and Foran was done up like a pox doctor's clerk. 1965 P. Ferris Doctors iii. 57 They [sc. coloured doctors] can land a job in London as a pathologist or a pox-doctor, but that's about all. 1974 Bulletin (Sydney) 19 Jan. 13 Getting dressed up like Lord Muck and getting round kitted up like a flamin' pox doctor's clerk. |
| 1922 Joyce Ulysses 419 And snares of the *poxfiend. |
| a 1915 ― Giacomo Joyce (1968) 9 The *pox-fouled wenches and young wives that, gaily yielding to their ravishers, clip and clip again. |
| 1682 New Eng. Hist. & Gen. Reg. LII. 27 A tall thin⁓faced fellow *pocks rotten. |
| c 1700 Kennett Lansd. MS. 1033 lf. 305 b, Above the coal mines at Chedle in Staffordshire they have a rock of a greyish colour, called *pox-stone so very hard, that where they doe not luckily meet with a cleft, they are forced to put fire to it, to soften it, or make it flaw. |
▪ II. pox, v. Only in vulgar use.
[f. prec. n.] trans. To infect with the pox (
i.e., usually, with syphilis). Also in imprecations (
cf. prec. 3). Also
transf. and
fig. Hence
poxed (
pɒkst)
ppl. a.| 1682 Dryden Medal 266 And the pox'd Nation feels Thee in their Brains. 1710 Swift Jrnl. to Stella 29 Sept., The dean friendly! The dean be pox't. 1712 Arbuthnot John Bull iii. iii, Jack..persuaded Peg that all mankind, besides himself, were poxed by that scarlet-faced whore. 1766 T. Amory Buncle (1770) IV. xiii. 249 She..lives..to ruin the fortune, pox the body, and for ever damn the soul of the miserable man. 1784 Prince William Let. 23 July in P. Ziegler King William IV (1971) iii. 51 Oh, for..the pretty girls of Westminster..such as would not clap or pox me every time I fucked. 1802 G. Galloway in Admirable Crichton 70 Tho' we were pox'd wi' poverty and law. 1846 Swell's Night Guide 45 These kens are tenanted by a blackguard..school of pugging shakes, whose chief fame is in..poxing a swaddy. 1933 M. Lowry Ultramarine i. 51 That boy got all poxed up to the eyeballs, voyage before last... Yes, he was poxed all away to hell. 1935 in Sc. Nat. Dict. (1968) VII. 225/1 When I wuz away for my breakfast my mate oot o' pure duvilment poxt the stone on me. 1961 ‘F. O'Brien’ Hard Life xiv. 115 Conditions on the canal bank are nothing short of a scandal with men and women going about there poxed-up to the eyes. 1968 Amer. Speech 1967 XLII. 295 Pox, a general colloquial term for ‘ruining or damaging stone through faulty handling, milling, or carving’. 1968 Sc. Nat. Dict. VII. 225/1 Pox, v.,..to botch (a job), ruin (a piece of work). 1970 G. F. Newman Sir, You Bastard iii. 92 The car became expedient. He was poxed with running for trains, missing trains, and worse, catching trains crowded with sickly commuters. 1977 Sat. Rev. (U.S.) 23 July 15/2 Wilmington, Delaware, poxed at that time by 1,200 abandoned one- and two-story homes. |