biddy

   One might in modern English hear a reference to a ‘biddy’, especially an ‘old biddy’, meaning a woman, but as a vocative the word is almost never used. What is sometimes heard, especially in Ireland, is ‘Biddy’ being used as a pet name for a woman who is Bridget. There were at one time so many Irish Bridgets scattered throughout the English-speaking world, all of them familiarly addressed as Biddy, that the name became a slang word for woman, much as ‘judy’ became ‘woman’ in Australia for similar reasons. In Twelfth Night (3:iv) Sir Toby Belch tells Malvolio: ‘Biddy, come with me.’ This is a different word, used in some dialects for a chicken. Its use to Malvolio continues Sir Toby’s ‘fowl’ theme, since he has just called him ‘my bawcock’ and ‘chuck’. The word ‘chickabiddy’, a child’s word for a chicken, is not recorded until the eighteenth century but may have been in use earlier.