doylem

English

Alternative forms

• doilem, doylum

Etymology

Uncertain; Yaron Matras includes the term in his dictionary of Angloromani, connecting it to Romani dinilo (“a fool”) and Yiddish goylem (“a fool”). Alternatively, related to the older dialectal term doychle (“a stupid person”). Possibly also connected to doy (a disdainful indication that something is obvious).

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /ˈdɔɪləm/, /ˈdɔɪlɪm/

Noun

doylem (plural doylems)

1. (Geordie, Mackem, Yorkshire, slang, derogatory) A stupid person; an idiot.

   Synonyms: see Thesaurus:idiot

   • 1994 September 20, Bob Another beer, please Christ, “Dog story...”, in rec.pets.dogs‎^[1] (Usenet):

     "Ye're a bloody doylem, you are, ye daft southe'n twat! C'mon, Sally, walk on". Sally looked up at him, then at me, and sat down again, craning her head forward between my arms, and sniffing. Pierre's game was *much* more interesting than walking with Donald. It had muck, and dirt, and some *very* interesting smells.

   • 1996, Stuart Pawson, The Judas Sheep, London: Headline Book Publishing, →ISBN, page 28:

     We shouldn't speak ill of the dead, but he was a bit of a doylem.

   • 1999 April 14, Pr0tocol, “BO”, in alt.ph.uk‎^[2] (Usenet):

     You stupid little fucking halflife, 20 second alone with Infoseek or Altavista would have given you this (Lame) program from 100's of sites run by fucking doylums like your good self

   • 2001, Bill Broady, “The Tale of the Golden Bath-Taps”, in In This Block There Lives a Slag...and Other Yorkshire Fables, London: Flamingo, →ISBN, page 207:

     The end of another crap gig: we'd played great music — badly — to the usual drunken doylems in a well-strafed WMC.

   • 2005, Bernard Hare, Urban Grimshaw and the Shed Crew, London: Sceptre, →ISBN, page 78:

     A couple of half-decent birds, but otherwise the whole place was some kind of funny farm for disturbed, nonced-up, rat-faced, smegma-sandwich-eating doilems.

   • 2011, John Donoghue, Police, Crime & 999: The True Story of a Front Line Officer, Leicester, Leicestershire: Matador, →ISBN, page 16:

     The shows could then provide a valuable service to society, allowing the divvy and radgie to air their pointless grievances to their heart's content in front of an army of happy daytime TV watching doylems ...and let the police get on with some proper work instead.

   • 2020, Penny Thorpe, The Mothers of Quality Street, London: HarperCollinsPublishers, →ISBN, page 290:

     'Now look what you've done, you total doylum! It's half off me!' Mary hissed at her sister.

Further reading

• “Etymology of 'doylum'”, in Stack Exchange‎^[3], 2013 September 14, archived from the original on 2023-03-20