emvowel

present singular third person emvowels · US participle present emvoweling · UK participle present emvowelling · US participle past emvoweled · US past emvoweled · UK participle past emvowelled · UK past emvowelled · alternative envowel

1. datedhumorousTo replace a portion of a person's name with a dash in printing, in order to avoid libel.

   But this barbarous custom of emvowelling words, is now quite exploded, in prose at least, by the best authors.

   1775, Richard Wynne, “Appendix”, in An Universal Grammar, London, page 122

   5 more examples

   And as for all the words I embowel, or rather emvowel, I will never ſo mangle them, but they ſhall be all as well known as if they retained every vowel in them.

   1747 December 28, Henry Fielding, The Gentleman's Magazine, London, page 579, column 2

   Finally, to judge whether ſhe is abſolutely cried up as a BEAUTY, we muſt conſult the wooden regiſters, the benches in the public walks, and the window-panes in coffee-houſes and taverns; where you'll be ſure to ſee her name in acroſticks, or either emvowel'd, or written in full length, accompanied with the moſt emphatical endearing expreſſions.

   1751, The Student: Or, The Oxford and Cambridge Monthly Miscellany, Oxford, page 257

   I ſhall not encroach on the Old Baily Patriot in his priviledge of emvowelling, daſhing, aſterizing, and italicizing.

   1752 January 16, Bonnell Thornton, Have At You All: or, The Drury-Lane Journal, London, page 13

   I reprobate the bold practice of licentiouly printing names at full length, without as much as modeſtly embowelling, or rather emvowelling them, or pleaſantly holding their owners in greater deriſion by a contemptuous alteration of them[.]

   1762 November 28, The London Magazine: or, Gentleman's Monthly Intelligencer, London, page 590, column 2

   Yes—it ſtands forth to public view, Within, without, on white, on blue, In proper, tall, gigantic Letters, Not daſh'd—emvowell'd—like my betters.

   1763 February 28, Robert Lloyd, The St. James's Magazine, London: W. Flexney, page 374