Clump and fourpenny one

[heretic666]

The meaning I will give you a clump is obvious but what is a clump?
And back to my childhood in the 60's for the same punitive action .......
I will fetch you a fourpenny one. what from where.?????

[Mosaic]

I'm guessing, but clump sounds like thump and is possibly just a local dialectic quirk.
A fourpenny one sounds like a music-hall type reference to goodies like ice-creams or buns - hence a fourpenny one being the biggest.
fetching somebody one is a variant on thumping (or indeed clumping) them - so fetching them a fourpenny one becomes witty slang for walloping them. I guess.

[heretic666]

Maths wrong. Ice cream and buns a penny or less. I hallf remember a fourpenny loaf being large but that goes nowhere

[HowardKennitby]

Fourpenny one - a clip round the ear-hole.
Again from rhyming slang - fourpenny bit = hit.

[Mosaic]

Just found this:
http://www.theanswerb...s/Question350175.html

[heretic666]

As a numismatist I have never heard of the groat being referred to a fourpenny bit. Do you have a source?

[emmie]

clump around the ear, and fourpenny one, punch on the nose, or thereabouts
at least that is what i remember

[HowardKennitby]

from your highly esteemed OED

fourpenny, a.
[f. four a. + penny.]
1. a. That costs or is valued at four pence. fourpenny ale, ale sold at four pence a quart; fourpenny bit or piece, a silver coin of the value of four pence;

[Quizmonster]

Clump, meaning a blow or knock, was first recorded in Jerome K Jerome's 'Three Men in a Boat', published in 1889. It might possibly just be an amalgamation of CLout and thUMP.

[Mosaic]

"As a numismatist I have never heard of the groat being referred to a fourpenny bit. Do you have a source?"

Any work on numismatics.

[Bert]

When was the 'fourpenny bit' last in circulation? How old is the expression 'I'll give (or fetch) you a fourpenny one? If they were both current at the same time, I could accept the offered explanation. But why should the fourpenny name be given to a blow? If the threatened blow is to be feared, surely a much higher value would be placed on it. A sovereign or a guinea, perhaps.
My suggestion, no evidence whatsoever, is a thrip'n'y-bit = hit, so a fourp'n'y one is that much harder than a thrip'n'y one.

[Quizmonster]

The earliest recorded use of 'fourpenny bit' is from 1890; oddly enough, the reference speaks of the fact that the coin has (quote) "...ceased from circulation."
A 'fourpenny one", meaning a blow, dates back only to the mid-1930s.