Clem
name, noun, verb, slang ·Moderate ·College level
Definitions
- 1 A brick or stone. Geordie, Teesside, slang
- 2 One stone (unit of mass). slang
- 3 A testicle. Geordie, slang, vulgar
- 1 To be hungry; starve. UK, dialectal, intransitive, transitive
""[…] Here he's back home again, and without work, and without a penny, and thou knows t' little one and I were pretty well clemmed to death when thou got us a bit o' bread and meat last night. We were that!""
- 2 Alternative form of clam (“to adhere”). alt-of, alternative
- 1 A unisex given name.; A diminutive of the male given name Clement.
- 2 A unisex given name.; A diminutive of the female given name Clementine.
Example
More examples""[…] Here he's back home again, and without work, and without a penny, and thou knows t' little one and I were pretty well clemmed to death when thou got us a bit o' bread and meat last night. We were that!""
Etymology
Inherited from Middle English *clemmen, *clammen, from Old English clemman, clæmman (“to press, surround”), from Proto-West Germanic *klammjan (“to squeeze”). Cognate with Dutch klemmen (“to jam, pinch, stick”), German klemmen (“to jam, clamp; to be stuck, stick [to a surface]”).
From Old English clām (“paste, mortar, mud, clay, poultice”), from Proto-West Germanic *klaim, equivalent to cloam. Similar linguistic development led to the Northumbrian pronunciation of hyem, equivalent to the RP home.
Shortening.