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Blackadder vocabulary
219 vocabulary words, including people, places, music, artists, etc.
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spinning jenny
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► definition
Definition:a spinning wheel machine with eight rather than the customary one spindle. The productivity improvement caused the price of yarn to fall and angry spinners broke into the inventor's house to destroy the machines. That didn't last. Eventually the machine capacity grew to 120 spindles during the industrial revolution and put most spinners out of business.
photo: by Markus Schweiß under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License, Version 1.2 or any later
► uses
Uses:
A: Right, everybody out! Smash the spinning jenny! Burn the rolling Rosalind! Destroy the going-up-and-down-a-bit-and-then-moving-along Gertrude! And death to the stupid Prince who grows fat on the profits!
BBC. Blackadder, season 3: Sense and Seniility
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There’s plenty of Radical scum — I say, beware of the scum, and look out for the cream. And here’s my nephew — some of the cream, if there is any: none of your Whigs, none of your painted water that looks as if it ran, and it’s standing still all the while; none of your spinning-jenny fellows. A gentleman; but up to all sorts of business.
George Eliot. Felix Holt the Radical (1866)
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