A code study edition

English ↔ Back slang

A Dream Within a Dream · every word turned round

Edition: complete · every word reversed by the costermongers' rule · unreviewed project draft

Back slang is the secret trade talk of London's Victorian street sellers. You spell a word backwards and say what you see, so boy becomes yob. Here the whole poem is turned round, word by word, and the panel turns round anything you type.

Read the poem ↓ Learn the rules ↓

Turn it round

Type any word or line

yob

Back slang reverses the spelling, then says the result out loud as it looks. Try your own name.

486letters turned round

85different words to practise

1851first described in print, by Henry Mayhew

yobthe one word everyone still knows

Part one / The poem

The poem, line by line

Every word of Poe's poem spelled backwards, with punctuation and capitals left where they were. Select a line number for its study note.

Line	English · source	Back slang · reversed spelling
	Take this kiss upon the brow!	Ekat siht ssik nopu eht worb!
	And, in parting from you now,	Dna, ni gnitrap morf uoy won,
	Thus much let me avow —	Suht hcum tel em wova —
	You are not wrong, who deem	Uoy era ton gnorw, ohw meed
	That my days have been a dream;	Taht ym syad evah neeb a maerd;
	Yet if hope has flown away	Tey fi epoh sah nwolf yawa
	In a night, or in a day,	Ni a thgin, ro ni a yad,
	In a vision, or in none,	Ni a noisiv, ro ni enon,
	Is it therefore the less gone?	Si ti erofereht eht ssel enog?
	All that we see or seem	Lla taht ew ees ro mees
	Is but a dream within a dream.	Si tub a maerd nihtiw a maerd.
	I stand amid the roar	I dnats dima eht raor
	Of a surf-tormented shore,	Fo a frus-detnemrot erohs,
	And I hold within my hand	Dna I dloh nihtiw ym dnah
	Grains of the golden sand —	Sniarg fo eht nedlog dnas —
	How few! yet how they creep	Woh wef! tey woh yeht peerc
	Through my fingers to the deep,	Hguorht ym sregnif ot eht peed,
	While I weep — while I weep!	Elihw I peew — elihw I peew!
	O God! Can I not grasp	O Dog! Nac I ton psarg
	Them with a tighter clasp?	Meht htiw a rethgit psalc?
	O God! can I not save	O Dog! nac I ton evas
	One from the pitiless wave?	Eno morf eht sselitip evaw?
	Is all that we see or seem	Si lla taht ew ees ro mees
	But a dream within a dream?	Tub a maerd nihtiw a maerd?

Part two / How it works

Four rules from the street

Mayhew and Hotten collected the words from costermongers in the 1850s. The method behind them comes down to four habits.

1 · Spell it backwards

Take the written word, not the sound, and reverse its letters.

boy → yob · penny → yennep · pint → tinep

2 · Say what you see

The reversed spelling is then read aloud as if it were an English word, silent letters and all. That is why knife came out as eefink, not fine.

take → ekat (EE-kat)

3 · Smooth the hard ones

Where the result could not be said, costers changed it: added a vowel, swapped a letter, or kept only part. Police became esclop, then just slop.

police → esclop → slop · old → dillo

4 · Numbers and money

Back slang was a trade language, and its best-recorded words are the ones for counting and prices.

one → eno · nine → enin · pound → dunop

This edition applies rule 1 strictly to every word of Poe's poem, so you can always undo it by reading backwards. Where a Victorian source records a different form for one of the poem's words, the word list says so: in this poem that is only ONE, recorded as eno.

Practice

Turn it back

A back-slang word from the poem is shown. Pick the English word it came from.

0 of 0 correct

Practice with every word

Every word of the poem

All 85 different words of the poem, in the order they first appear. Read the back slang aloud, then reveal the English.

Back slang → English

How to practise

Say the back-slang word aloud exactly as it is spelled.
Read it backwards in your head to find the English.
Reveal, then find the word in the poem.
Talk to a friend in back slang until neither of you has to stop and think.

See the full word list (85 words)

take	ekat	line 1 · 1×
this	siht	line 1 · 1×
kiss	ssik	line 1 · 1×
upon	nopu	line 1 · 1×
the	eht	line 1 · 6×
brow	worb	line 1 · 1×
and	dna	line 2 · 2×
in	ni	line 2 · 5×
parting	gnitrap	line 2 · 1×
from	morf	line 2 · 2×
you	uoy	line 2 · 2×
now	won	line 2 · 1×
thus	suht	line 3 · 1×
much	hcum	line 3 · 1×
let	tel	line 3 · 1×
me	em	line 3 · 1×
avow	wova	line 3 · 1×
are	era	line 4 · 1×
not	ton	line 4 · 3×
wrong	gnorw	line 4 · 1×
who	ohw	line 4 · 1×
deem	meed	line 4 · 1×
that	taht	line 5 · 3×
my	ym	line 5 · 3×
days	syad	line 5 · 1×
have	evah	line 5 · 1×
been	neeb	line 5 · 1×
a	a	line 5 · 10×
dream	maerd	line 5 · 5×
yet	tey	line 6 · 2×
if	fi	line 6 · 1×
hope	epoh	line 6 · 1×
has	sah	line 6 · 1×
flown	nwolf	line 6 · 1×
away	yawa	line 6 · 1×
night	thgin	line 7 · 1×
or	ro	line 7 · 4×
day	yad	line 7 · 1×
vision	noisiv	line 8 · 1×
none	enon	line 8 · 1×
is	si	line 9 · 3×
it	ti	line 9 · 1×
therefore	erofereht	line 9 · 1×
less	ssel	line 9 · 1×
gone	enog	line 9 · 1×
all	lla	line 10 · 2×
we	ew	line 10 · 2×
see	ees	line 10 · 2×
seem	mees	line 10 · 2×
but	tub	line 11 · 2×
within	nihtiw	line 11 · 3×
I	I	line 12 · 6×
stand	dnats	line 12 · 1×
amid	dima	line 12 · 1×
roar	raor	line 12 · 1×
of	fo	line 13 · 2×
surf-tormented	frus-detnemrot	line 13 · 1×
shore	erohs	line 13 · 1×
hold	dloh	line 14 · 1×
hand	dnah	line 14 · 1×
grains	sniarg	line 15 · 1×
golden	nedlog	line 15 · 1×
sand	dnas	line 15 · 1×
how	woh	line 16 · 2×
few	wef	line 16 · 1×
they	yeht	line 16 · 1×
creep	peerc	line 16 · 1×
through	hguorht	line 17 · 1×
fingers	sregnif	line 17 · 1×
to	ot	line 17 · 1×
deep	peed	line 17 · 1×
while	elihw	line 18 · 2×
weep	peew	line 18 · 2×
O	O	line 19 · 2×
God	Dog	line 19 · 2×
can	nac	line 19 · 2×
grasp	psarg	line 19 · 1×
them	meht	line 20 · 1×
with	htiw	line 20 · 1×
tighter	rethgit	line 20 · 1×
clasp	psalc	line 20 · 1×
save	evas	line 21 · 1×
one	eno	line 22 · 1× · attested
pitiless	sselitip	line 22 · 1×
wave	evaw	line 22 · 1×

Background

Behind the barrow

The costers

Mayhew counted thirty to forty thousand costermongers, London's fruit and vegetable sellers, in the 1850s. They used back slang to talk in front of customers and police without being understood.

Into print

The first account is in Mayhew's London Labour and the London Poor, 1851. John Camden Hotten's Dictionary of Modern Slang, Cant and Vulgar Words followed in 1859 with the first back-slang word list.

What survived

Butchers and market traders kept it into the 20th century. Only yob passed into everyday English, and it has gone from meaning any boy to meaning a lout.

Sources

Pages consulted

Back slang, Wikipedia
Dick Sullivan, Earth Yenneps: Victorian Back Slang, The Victorian Web
Victorian back slang word list (after Hotten 1860 and Mayhew 1851), The Victorian Web
Appendix: Costermongers' back slang, Wiktionary
The history of back slang, Roman Road London
Henry Mayhew, London Labour and the London Poor, vol. 1 (1851)
John Camden Hotten, A Dictionary of Modern Slang, Cant and Vulgar Words (1859; 2nd ed. 1860)