poppet

n.

1. A poppet valve.
2. Nautical.
   1. A small wooden strip on a gunwale that forms or supports an oarlock.
   2. One of the beams of a launching cradle supporting a ship's hull.
3. Chiefly British. A darling.

[Middle English popet, small child, doll, puppet. See puppet.]

poppy shows

A display custom of children in the 19th and early 20th centuries, where they arranged flowers, small dolls, dolls’ house furnishings, etc., inside a shoe-box or similar container; adults or other children would be asked to pay a penny, or sometimes only a pin, for the privilege of looking in through a slit in the side. Poppies were not necessarily used; the name may be a misunderstanding of ‘peepshow’. As children carried their boxes through the street, they would chant such rhymes as:

A pin to see the poppet show
All manners of colours oh!
See the ladies all below!

A recent informant recalls how, as a little girl living in Hove (Sussex) in the 1920s, she would put ferns or beach pebbles on the bottom of a shoe-box, and then flowers and ‘little bits and pieces of coloured glass, feathers, shells—anything to make a pretty pattern’, especially, if possible, ‘coloured paper from a sweet wrapping’. Boys in Norwood (London) at the same period made peepshows in cereal boxes, depicting scenes from stories or nursery rhymes.

Bibliography
The full bibliography list is available here.

• Gomme, 1894: 41-2
• Irene Saxby, London Lore 1:2 (1978), 19-20

Note: click on a word meaning below to see its connections and related words.

The noun has one meaning:

Meaning #1: a mushroom-shaped valve that rises perpendicular from its seat; commonly used in internal-combustion engines
  Synonym: poppet valve

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Dansk (Danish)
n. - lille skat, skvætbord

Nederlands (Dutch)
schatje, steekbout

Français (French)
n. - puce, amour

Deutsch (German)
n. - (ugs.) Schätzchen

Ελληνική (Greek)
n. - (σε προσφώνηση) αγαπούλα, μωρό, χρυσούλι, (μηχαν.) βαλβίδα κυλίνδρου κινητήρα εσωτερικής καύσεως

Italiano (Italian)
piccino, poppante

Português (Portuguese)
n. - cabeçote de torno (m), boneca (m)

Русский (Russian)
лапочка, крошка

Español (Spanish)
n. - cabezal, hijito, amor

Svenska (Swedish)
n. - sötnos, docka (om liten flicka)

中文（简体）(Chinese (Simplified))
乖孩子, 小枕木, 提升阀门

中文（繁體）(Chinese (Traditional))
n. - 乖孩子, 小枕木, 提升閥門

한국어 (Korean)
n. - 귀여운 아이(애칭), 침묵

日本語 (Japanese)
n. - かわい子ちゃん, ポペット, 心受台

العربيه (Arabic)
‏(الاسم) العزيز, المحبوب, الصمام القفاز‏

עברית (Hebrew)
n. - ‮בובה'לה, מותק, שסתום‬

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