Talk:duchess

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Duchess as a verb[edit]

Still relatively common in Australia, particularly when discussing political or business manoeuvres. See for example:

Cybrspunk 21:58, 7 May 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Duchess as an Australian verb[edit]

I noticed the verb form is labelled "(UK, informal)". I could have sworn it's an Australianism so I googled a bit and that seems to be the case - the dictionaries that recognize it mostly attribute it that way. Revision history tells me a) the original edit adding the verb did identify it as Australian and 2) it got switched to British in the 15:09, 23 February 2012‎ edit by User:Pingku, while they were adding the (still present) quotations. Fun thing is, all of the quotations are from Australian books by Australian authors! So I think I'll re-label it back to Australian. The end. Lainagier (talk) 20:18, 24 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]

@Lainagier That looks fine. Thanks. I guess I went into sceptical mode and forgot to switch back. (I'd been picking up loads of terms flagged Australian simply because they are also used here. Not technically wrong, but not helpful when overused.) There may be enough evidence for another verb sense - "make into a duchess" - or maybe simply a noun duchessing and/or adjective duchessed. Not Australian in origin, I don't think, but if real, the verb might be a stepping stone. It looks as though I stopped looking because the evidence was thin on the ground. I may get back to it.— Pingkudimmi 06:27, 27 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]