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Glossary of names for the British#Limey

Text and/or other creative content from this version of Limey was copied or moved into Glossary of names for the British. The former page's history now serves to provide attribution for that content in the latter page, and it must not be deleted as long as the latter page exists.

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+#REDIRECT [[Glossary of names for the British#Limey]]
-{{short description|American slang nickname for British person}}
-{{for multi|the 1999 film|The Limey|the French village|Limey-Remenauville|the mixtape by Rainy Milo|Limey (mixtape)}}
-[[File:British School - A Sailor Sitting on a Chest, c.1790 - BHC1083 - Royal Museums Greenwich.jpg|thumb|British sailor]]
-"'''Limey'''" (from [[Lime (fruit)|lime]] / [[lemon]]) is a predominantly American [[slang]] [[nickname]] for a [[British people|British person]] that has been around since the mid 19th century.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.learnersdictionary.com/search/limey|work=Merriam-Webster's Learner's Dictionary|title=''lim·ey''|access-date=2012-11-27}}</ref><ref name=OxfordDictionary>[https://web.archive.org/web/20120427130833/http://oxforddictionaries.com/definition/Limey Oxford Dictionaries: ''Limey ''] Retrieved 2011-07-06</ref>
-==History==
-The term is thought to have originated in the 1850s as ''lime-juicer'',<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/lime-juicer|work=Merriam-Webster|title=''lime–juic·er''|access-date=2012-11-27}}</ref> later shortened to "limey",<ref name=Dictionary>{{cite web|url=http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/limey|work=Dictionary.com|title=limey|access-date=2012-11-27}}</ref> and originally used as a derogatory word for [[Sailor|sailors]] in the [[Royal Navy|British Royal Navy]]. Since the beginning of the 19th century, it had been the practice of the Royal Navy to add [[lemon juice]] to the sailors' daily [[ration]] of [[grog]] (watered-down [[rum]]). The [[vitamin C]] (specifically {{nowrap|L-ascorbic}} acid) in citrus fruits prevented [[scurvy]]<ref name=OxfordDictionary/> {{crossref|(see [[James Lind]])}} and helped to make these sailors some of the healthiest of the time. At that time, "[[lemon]]" and "[[Lime (fruit)|lime]]" were used interchangeably to refer to citrus fruits.<ref name="Scott and Scurvy">{{Cite web |last=Cegłowski |first=Maciej |author-link=Maciej Cegłowski |title=Scott And Scurvy |url=https://idlewords.com/2010/03/scott_and_scurvy.htm |date=2010-03-06 |work=Idle Words |access-date=2016-05-31 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220507185920/https://idlewords.com/2010/03/scott_and_scurvy.htm |archive-date=2022-05-07 |url-status=live}}</ref>{{Unreliable source?|date=May 2022}} Initially, lemon juice (from lemons imported from Europe) was used as the additive to grog on the Royal Navy ships but was later switched to limes (grown in British colonies), not realizing that limes contained only a quarter of the vitamin C the lemons had, and that the way the juice was stored and processed destroyed much of that, leaving the lime juice unable to prevent scurvy.<ref name="Scott and Scurvy" />
-In time, the term lost its naval connotation and was used to refer to British people in general, and in the 1880s, British immigrants in Australia, New Zealand, and South Africa.<ref name=Dictionary/> Although the term may have been used earlier in the [[United States Navy|U.S. Navy]] as slang for a British sailor or a British warship, such usage was not documented until 1918.<ref name=Dictionary/> By 1925, the usage of ''limey'' in [[American English]] had been extended to mean any British person, and the term was so commonly known that it was featured in American newspaper headlines.<ref name=Dictionary/>
-==See also==
-{{Wiktionary|limey}}
-*[[Alternative names for the British]]
-*[[Tommy Atkins]]
-==Notes==
-{{Reflist}}
-{{Ethnic slurs}}
 [[Category:Anti-British sentiment]]
-[[Category:Ethnic and religious slurs]]
+[[Category:Pejorative terms for European people]]
 [[Category:English words]]
+{{Copied
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