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Home > Phrases & Sayings > Word Origins > Bloke.

Bloke.

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mariner2 | 23:28 Mon 11th Feb 2008 | Word Origins
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Great word, but where did it come from?
prev Why, on this website, if you put something in inverted commas, it comes out like this?
  
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Avatar Image Whickerman
It's from Irish Traveller (a type of Gypsy)dialect. (heard that on the radio today, from the writer of this book:
http://books.google.com/books?hl=en&id=uPo0oB1 9gDUC&dq=hiberno+irish+dictionary&printsec=fro ntcover&source=web&ots=NHd23jybyW&sig=bjU7eW7p uRu8RC7SGro_4ArcbDc )

23:30 Mon 11th Feb 2008
Avatar Image Quizmonster
According to The Oxford English Dictionary, the origin is unknown. However, it points out that one etymologist suggested it might have come from a gypsy word, 'loke', meaning a man. Obviously, the editors of the dictionary were not sufficiently convinced.
Chambers DIctionary takes the same view, so I would be wary of any suggestion that the origin is clear.
08:00 Tue 12th Feb 2008
Avatar Image Rooboru
It came from a bloke who used to live just the other side of the black stump in Australia many many moons ago......
Pretty safe bet he's gone by now... the poor bloke......
08:32 Wed 12th Mar 2008

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