ABSTRACT
The previous chapter, in which I looked at BLWs (bad language words) in the late twentieth century, focused largely on swear words. While in this chapter I will, once again, discuss bad language, the term will mask a certain confusion. What was termed swearing in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries was actually quite different from modern swearing, as the word swearing was related to the swearing of oaths. The swearing of oaths in itself, however, did constitute bad language. Yet while profligate swearing in the seventeenth century may have been a cause of offence, it was distinct from obscene language, which was much closer to what one may term modern swearing. Also, while both potentially offensive, obscene language and swearing were not the only causes of potential linguistic offence in this period. Blasphemy, as will be discussed in this chapter, was an important source of offence, too. So, unless the discussion is of a specific form of bad language, in this chapter the term ‘bad language’ will be used to encompass all forms of speech and writing found to be morally offensive in this period.
