dog Latin

American  

noun

1. mongrel or spurious Latin.

2. a jargon imitating Latin.

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dog Latin British  

noun

1. spurious or incorrect Latin

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Etymology

Origin of dog Latin

First recorded in 1760–70

Example Sentences

Excellent dog Latin," said Jacques; "and literally translated it signifies: 'Gold from the Governor, Tobacco from the South Side, Asinarian strategy Has brought into his chambers.'

From The Youth of Jefferson A Chronicle of College Scrapes at Williamsburg, in Virginia, A.D. 1764 by Anonymous

The wit is not enough to carry on the joke through 108 letters, carefully composed in Teutonic dog Latin by the best Latinists north of the Brenner.

From Lectures on Modern history by Acton, John Emerich Edward Dalberg Acton, Baron

In the first of them, Belinda, translated into dog Latin, which was there as elsewhere one of the faceti� of young collegians, became Campana in die, that is, bell in day.

From The Youth of Jefferson A Chronicle of College Scrapes at Williamsburg, in Virginia, A.D. 1764 by Anonymous

It is not dog Latin, but Latin ingeniously italianized, or rather Italian, even Mantuan, latinized.

From Gargantua and Pantagruel, Illustrated, Book 1 by Motteux, Peter Anthony

His precise, curial style was easily victorious over the Jesuit's dog Latin, and his expressive German, with his pithy Lutheranisms, was more than a match for the general's Platt-Deutsch dialect.

From Pretty Michal by Jókai, Mór