Dictionary

brummagem en · ADJ

Etymology

From Birmingham, England where cheap manufactured goods used to be produced.

Meanings

1. (not-comparable) Cheap and showy; meretricious.
   • The colloquial form of the city’s name thus entered the language as a contemptuous epithet. In 1861 the word was used to describe “The vulgar dandy, strutting along, with his Brummajem jewellry”; to “Birminhamize” was “to artificialize.” 2002, Rachel Crawford, Poetry, enclosure, and the vernacular landscape, 1700–1830, Cambridge University Press, →ISBN, →LCCN, page 160:
   • "My, my, my, my, my," said a voice from behind them, and the Baudelaire orphans turned to find Stephano standing there,...a look of brummagem surprise on his face. "Brummagem" is such a rare word for "fake" that even Klaus didn't know what it meant, but the children did not have to be told that Stephano was pretending to be surprised. 1999, Lemony Snicket, The Reptile Room:
   • The unhappy man (who had cheated the sailors), innocent of danger, is seated on a grating with his combs, spy-glasses, necklaces, ribbons, and all the rest of his "Brummagem" trumpery, spread out before him. 1893, Graham Everitt, English Caricaturists and Graphic Humourists of the Nineteenth Century, page 175:

Forms

brummagem en · NOUN

Etymology

From Birmingham, England where cheap manufactured goods used to be produced.

Meanings

1. (alt-of, alternative) Alternative form of Brummagem (“person from Birmingham”).
   alt of Brummagem
2. (alt-of, alternative) Alternative form of Brummagem (“counterfeit coin”).
   alt of Brummagem

Forms

Relateds

Birminghamize