Please Tell Me About the Bow Bells...

UK boardmembers, this might be one for you. If you can hear the Bow Bells (I've heard this more than one place BTW—St. Mary-le-Bow or whatever?), you're a true cockney.


That's a fascinating story. What's the origin?


And I mean, hearing is so subjective. My hearing is fading as I get older. What if my neighbor hears them, but I don't? Am I a cockney? Do hearing enhancements count? What about a hearing aid? I'm serious .

 

My Father was a cockney. You have to be born near the sound of the Bow Bells, to be a true cockney.

 

You're the new cockney Queenie!

 

Nah not me. I am Royal Berkshire

 

Originating in the East End of London, the term Cockney refers to anyone born within the sound of the church bells of St Mary-le-Bow in Cheapside, the City of London.

Where did the term Cockney come from?

The word Cockney has had a pejorative connotation, originally deriving from cokenay, or cokeney, a late Middle English word of the 14th century that meant, literally, “cocks' egg” (i.e., a small or defective egg, imagined to come from a rooster—which, of course, cannot produce eggs).

 

Tis also true.

 

Why is there no Cockney Rhyming Slang for Pie and Mash?

 

I am so your hearing is fading.