Brummagem

Brummagem (originally Bromichan, Bremicham and many similar variants) is a local name for the city of Birmingham, UK.

It gave rise to the terms Brum (a generally affectionate local term for the city) and Brummie (inhabitants of the city, their accent and dialect, and frequently West Midlands accents in general).

It is also a term for a cheap and shoddy imitation, in particular when referring to mass-produced goods. This use is archaic in the UK, but persists in some specialist areas in the USA.

Contents
1 History
2 19th century
3 Modern usage
4 US usage
5 Brummagem in song
6 External links

History

The word appeared in the Middle Ages as a variant on the older and coexisting form Birmingham - spelt Bermingeham in the Domesday Book - and was in widespread use by the time of the Civil War.

Its negative use appears to have originated with the city's brief 17th century reputation for counterfeited groats.

It passed into political slang in the 1680s. The Protestant supporters of the Exclusion Bill were called by their opponents Birminghams or Brummagems (a slur, in allusion to counterfeiting, implying hypocrisy). Their Tory opponents were known as anti-Birminghams or anti-Brummagems.

Around 1690 Alexander Missen, visiting Bromichan in his travels, said that "swords, heads of canes, snuff-boxes, and other fine works of steel," could be had, "cheaper and better here than even in famed Milan."

In 1691, The New State of England by Guy Miege said that "Bromichan drives a good trade in iron and steel wares, saddles and bridles, which find good vent at London, Ireland, and other parts." By another writer, "Bromicham" is described as "a large and well-built town, very populous, much resorted to, and particularly noted a few years ago for the counterfeit groats made here, and dispersed all oven the kingdom".

In 1731, an old "Road-book" said that "Birmingham, Bromicham, or Bremicham, is a large town, well built and populous. The inhabitants, being mostly smiths, are very ingenious in their way, and vend vast quantities of all sorts of iron wares."

Around 1750, the "England's Gazetteer" described Birmingham or Bromichan as "a large, well-built, and populous town, noted for the most ingenious artificers in boxes, buckles, buttons, and other iron and steel wares; wherein such multitudes of people are employed that they are sent all over Europe; and here is a continual noise of hammers, anvils, and files."

Historian Carl Chinn has argued it likely that 'Birmingham' became the mainstream form in the 18th century through its adoption by prominent local industrialists such as Matthew Boulton to avoid the connotations of 'Brummagem'.

19th century

The pejorative use of the word was later applied to "Brummagem ware", cheap mass-produced goods such as costume jewellery manufactured in the city - not, it should be said, exclusively. Birmingham at the time was one of the world's largest industrial cities, producing a huge variety of quality goods. The significant button industry gave rise to the term 'Brummagem button': the 1836 The Pickwick Papers by Charles Dickens mentions it as a term for counterfeit silver coins, but Samuel Sidney's 1851 Rides on Railways refers to it as "an old-fashioned nickname for a Birmingham workman".

By the late 19th century, "Brummagem" had become a generalised term for anything cheap and shoddy disguised as something better. It was used figuratively in this context to refer to moral fakery: for instance, the The Times leader, January 29th 1838, reported Sir Robert Peel's slur on an opponent: "[he] knew the sort of Brummagem stuff he had to deal with, treated the pledge and him who made it with utter indifference".

However, as shown by James Dobbs' song I can't find Brummagem (see below), it remained in use as a geographical name for the city.

The Birmingham politican Joseph Chamberlain was nicknamed 'Brummagem Joe' (affectionately or satirically depending on the speaker). See, for instance, The Times, Aug 06, 1895: "'Chamberlain and his crew' dominated the city ... Mr Geard thought it was advisable to have a candidate against 'Brummagem Joe'".

Modern usage

"Brummagem" remained a staple of British political and critical discourse into the early 20th century: The Times, Aug 13, 1901 quoted a House of Commons speech by a Mr MacNeill, "The initiative of the Bill ... had the "Brummagem" brand from top to bottom. It was a mean attempt, inspired by the absurd and vulgar spirit of Imperialism, to subsidize the Crown with a parvenu title, and a tawdry gewgaw reputation".

A Punch magazine book review for December 1917 said: "But, to be honest, the others (with the exception of one quaint little comedy of a canine ghost) are but indifferent stuff, too full of snakes and hidden treasure and general tawdriness—the kind of Orientalism, in fact, that one used to associate chiefly with the Earl's Court Exhibition. Mrs. PERRIN must not mingle her genuine native goods with such Brummagem ware".

By the late 20th century and 21st century, British usage had shifted toward a purely geographical and even positive sense. The Housing Design Awards 1998 said of one Birmingham project, City Heights, "this gutsy Brummagem bruiser of a building handles its landmark status with ease and assurance". In The Guardian Notes from the touchline sport report, March 21, 2003, journalist Frank Keating used the headline "World Cup shines with dinkum Brummagem" to praise the performance of Birmingham-born Australian cricketer Andrew Symonds.

A particular activist in reclaiming the term as a traditional name reflecting positive aspects of the city's heritage is historian Carl Chinn MBE, Professor of Community History at the University of Birmingham, who produces a Brummagem Magazine.

US usage

In the USA, the negative usage appears to have been longer-lasting. F. Scott Fitzgerald's 1922 novel The Beautiful and Damned uses the word twice: "It was one of the type known as 'tourist' cars, a sort of brummagem Pullman ... a single patch of vivid green trees that guaranteed the brummagem umbrageousness of Riverside Drive". Gilbert Seldes, in his 1924 book The Seven Lively Arts, wrote in praise of Krazy Kat: "everything paste and brummagem has had its vogue with us; and a genuine, honest native product has gone unnoticed".

Currently US collectors of political memorabilia use "brummagem" to refer to imitations. The Dictionary of Sexual Terms and Expressions by Farlex Inc, maintainers of TheFreeDictionary.com, lists several related terms such as "Brummagem buttons", tufts sewn to brassiere cups to give the appearance of larger nipples.

Brummagem in song

I Can't Find Brummagem
(James Dobbs)
Full twenty years and more are passed / Since I left Brummagem.
But I set out for home at last / To good old Brummagem.
But ev'ry place is altered so / Now there's hardly a place I know
Which fills my heart with grief and woe / For I can't find Brummagem.
As I was walking down the street / As used to be in Brummagem,
I knowed nobody I did meet / For they've changed their face in Brummagem
Poor old Spiceal Stret's half gone / And Old Church stands alone
And poor old I stands here to groan / For I can't find Brummagem.
But amongst the changes we have got / In good old Brummagem
They've made a market on the moat / To sell the pigs in Brummagem.
But that has brought us more ill luck / For they've filled up Pudding Brook,
Where in the brook jack-bannils took / Near Good old Brummagem.
But what's more melancholy still / For poor old Brummagem,
They've taken away all Newhall-Hill / From poor old Brummagem,
At Easter time girls fair and brown / Came rolly-polly down,
And showed their legs to half the town / Oh! the good old sights in Brummagem.
Down Peck Lane I walked along / To find out Brummagem,
There was the dungil down and gone / What? no rogues in Brummagem,
They've ta'en it to a street called Moor / A sign that rogues ain't fewer,
But rogues won't like it there I'm sure / While Peck Lane's in Brummagem.
I remember one John Growse / Who buckles made in Brummagem,
He built himself a country house / To be out of the smoke of Brummagem
But though John's country house stands still / The town has walked up hill,
Now he lives beside a smoky mill / In the middle of Brummagem.
Among the changes that abound / In good old Brummagem,
May trade and happiness be found / In good old Brummagem.
And tho' no Newhall hil we've got / Nor Pudding Brook nor Moat,
May we always have enough / To boil the pot in Brummagem.

Written by James Dobbs (1781-1837), a Midland music hall entertainer. Collected in Victoria's Inferno: Songs of the Old Mills, Mines, Manufactories, Canals and Railways by Jon Raven, Broadside Books, 1978, ISBN 0950372234.

External links

See also: Brummagem, 1680s, 17th century, 18th century, 1917, 20th century, 21st century, Andrew Symonds, Anvil