Those who put on airs, no one likes. Because life is fragile and changeable, and what's the point in asking? In addition, everyone has self-respect, beliefs, values, and people do not like it when one reduces the important components of another being to the level of dust. Therefore, we came up with many different offensive and funny names for too arrogant people, one of which we will consider today. Let's answer the question: what is swell?
Origin
When words like multi-colored pebbles come across on the road, you immediately want to know their history. And we were not too lazy and rummaged through etymological dictionaries. And they found an interesting story about the origin of this word in our language.
So, originally, “tsatsa” is a childish word that expressed a whole range of meanings:
- good;
- smart;
- delicious.
Language, like a person, has achieved little - it is constantly transforming existing meanings. Therefore, it is not surprising that after some time the word acquired a different meaning - "toy" or "dressed as a toy." Then (and this meaning is known to many)- "overdressed woman", "touchy".
Interesting, huh? And even more interesting is this: why do words that first, appearing in the language, at the time of their “youth” carry either a neutral or positive meaning, and then degenerate into something unpleasant? Do the words reflect or hint at human dynamics? When a man is young, he has a more or less tolerable temper, but the older he gets, the worse his temper. But this is not the case with everyone, some with age, on the contrary, improve. The main thing is that our term is not lucky, and the next section will convince us of this.
Meaning
Let's start from the spot and to the quarry, and then we will consider interesting transformations of the studied definition. So, the explanatory dictionary says that a swell is a person who puts on airs, imagines a lot about himself. As we can see, and this should be noted right away, unlike the etymological dictionary, the explanatory one does not insist that the person who is called a tsatse must necessarily be a female. Over time, the noun has acquired a universal meaning. That is, a guy spinning in front of a mirror can also be called a swell, and this will not be regarded as a stylistic mistake.
Soviet cinema comes to the rescue - the film by Eldar Ryazanov "Office Romance" (1977). Remember that scene when Comrade Novoseltsev writes a letter of resignation? The boss and subordinate have a scandal, and L. P. Kalugina calls Novoseltsev a swell. I don't want to believe that our illustrious screenwriters E. Ryazanov and E. Braginskythey were poorly versed in the Russian language and put dubious remarks into the mouths of the characters. Moreover, the meaning of the word "tsatsa", recorded in the explanatory dictionary, does not contradict our observations.
Synonyms
To more clearly imagine the content of the word, you need to pick up more and synonyms for it. If the reader courageously overcame the whole distance and now, having heard that there will also be synonyms, he was horrified, then let him not be afraid: there will be no more than five of them:
- smart;
- pussy;
- proud;
- arrogant
- imagined.
A wonderful list, and most importantly - it is perfect if someone does not understand the meaning of "swell". But hopefully that didn't happen. After all, we tried to explain everything as best as possible so that all questions disappear. And yes, as always in such cases, we warn you: do not abuse the new knowledge that you have acquired. Still, swell is a curse word.
