blowen

blowen (plural blowens)

1. (obsolete, vulgar) A prostitute; a courtesan.
   • 1840, Regular Slangsman, The Flash Mirror, Or, Kiddy's Cabinet, page 12:

     Poll Strokem, an old blowen, well known about the streets of London, was continually crying; see her whenever you would, she was all snot and slobber, like a calf's head on a hot summer's day […]

   • August 1831, Bryan O'Toole, “Barney Moore”, in Blackwood Magazine:

     Many a blowen of saloonic fame

• blowess

• “blowen”, in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, Springfield, Mass.: G. & C. Merriam, 1913, →OCLC.

• Bowlen

Inherited from Old English blāwan, from Proto-West Germanic *blāan, from Proto-Germanic *blēaną.

• blouen, blow, blowe, blowyn
• blawe (Northern or Kent)
• blawen, bloawen (Early Middle English)

• IPA^(key): /ˈblɔu̯ən/
• (Northern) IPA^(key): /ˈblɑu̯(ən)/

blowen

1. To blow (produce a current of air):
   1. To blow away; to blow to eliminate or remove.
   2. To breathe (in or out); to inhale or exhale.
   3. To play a wind instrument (by blowing)
   4. To strengthen a fire by blowing on it.
   5. To inflate or blow up; to expand by blowing.
   6. To gasp; to struggle to breathe.
2. To spread a communicable disease (by exhalation).
3. To smelt; to extract metal from ore.
4. To make a sound, especially flatulence.
5. To insult or brag (talk coarsely)
6. To proclaim; to broadly disseminate.
7. (rare) To be blown around (by wind).

• blow
• blowere
• blowynge

• English: blow
• Geordie English: blaw
• Scots: blaw
• Yola: blay

• “blouen, v.(1).”, in MED Online, Ann Arbor, Mich.: University of Michigan, 2007, retrieved 2018-07-14.

Inherited from Old English blōwan, from Proto-West Germanic *blōan, from Proto-Germanic *blōaną.

• blowe

• IPA^(key): /ˈblɔu̯ən/

blowen

1. To blossom; to flower.
   • a. 1250, unknown, “Sumer is icumen in”‎:

     Lhude sing cuccu / Groweþ sed / and bloweþ med

     Sing loudly, cuckoo! / seed grows / and fields bloom

2. (figurative) To grow, to flourish.

This verb is occasionally weak, but usually remains strong, probably due to influence from Etymology 1.

• blowynge

• English: blow

• “blouen, v.(2).”, in MED Online, Ann Arbor, Mich.: University of Michigan, 2007, retrieved 2018-07-12.