Sorry Mr President, betrump is our favourite old word

FOR five centuries, betrump has languished on the scrapheap of forgotten words.

But now the term – meaning to deceive or cheat – could return after winning a poll to choose our favourite long-lost word.

It is unclear if the 42 per cent who voted for it were influenced by the similarity to Donald Trump’s surname.

But betrump was the runaway victor as the next best score was only 7.5 per cent.

Language experts scoured historic texts and dictionaries to find lost words and highlight how they could still be relevant in today’s world.

The team from the University of York then selected 30 for the public vote. Betrump will be submitted to the editors of the Oxford English Dictionary in the hope it could be included again after being out in the cold since the 16th century.

It has resurfaced just once in a newspaper article this year which suggested the word’s origins were in the Scots dialect and poked fun at the irony that President Trump has Scottish ancestry.

Words which missed the poll’s top five included fumish (meaning hot-tempered), wlonk (proud), snout-fair (comely or handsome), dowsabel (sweetheart) and losenger (false flatterer or lying rascal). The team led by Dr Dominic Watt, senior lecturer in language and linguistic science, spent three months finding the words.

He said: ‘ It appears betrump has captured the imagination of the nation and allowed people to re-engage with language of old.’

Christian Mendes, head of Privilege home insurance which organised the project, said: ‘We are constantly presented with new additions to the English language but rarely discuss the words that are leaving.

‘That’s why the campaign became so important – it allows us to understand the constantly evolving nature of English.’