My Own Private Dictionary

A few years ago, I started reading Georgette Heyer. To date, I've read nine of her Regency romances:

Sylvester: Or the Wicked Uncle
Frederica
Venetia
Cotillion
Regency Buck
The Reluctant Widow
Cousin Kate
The Toll-Gate
The Quiet Gentleman

And I found myself looking up any number of words as I went along. Always a good sign in a book, yes?

Herewith, a tiny glossary:

• Abigail - a lady's maid
• Almack's – an upper class mixed-sex public social club
• Cicisbeo – the escort to a married woman, like a walker
• Curricle - a light, open, two-wheeled carriage pulled by two horses side by side
• Domino – a robe-like costume worn at a masquerade ball 
• Farouche – sullen or shy, as in behavior
• Gig – a light, two-wheeled sprung cart pulled by one horse
• Gretna Green – a Scottish town (just over the border) where English people ran away to get married under less restrictive rules
• Jean – light denim fabric, as in “your boots are made of jean, not of kid”
• Lief – happily or soon – as in “he would just as lief eat a porcupine”
• Morganatic marriage – a marriage between people of unequal social rank – in the context of royalty, this would prevent the passage of the higher ranking person’s titles and privileges to the lower, and to any children born of the marriage.
• Obtunding – to dull or to blunt
• Phaeton – a sporty four-wheeled carriage, drawn by one or two horses, with extravagantly large wheels and open seating
• Plum – 100 pounds (or maybe more) 
• Rheumatic fever - a complication of untreated strep throat
• Se'enight – archaic word for a week (seven nights)
• Tilbury – a town in England, not far East of London
• Ton – upper crust English society
• Trevithick – English inventor of a steam engine 

Phaeton