ABSTRACT
The earliest instance, a memorial of the Hundred Years’ War, is goddems, the revealing nickname given by the French to the English, a point treated further in the entry for goddam The typical generation of nicknames for the enemy is shown in the German group from World War I: boche (1914), Fritz (1915), kraut (1918), and jerry (1919). Hitler was used as a stereotypical nickname from 1934, often preceded by the demeaning adjective little, a description still current in British English. Alternatively, jap and gook were originally generalized nicknames before taking on an especially xenophobic edge during World War II and the Vietnam War, respectively.
