Schoolchildren have always had a way with insults, but the inventive vernacular changes with the decades.
Many barbs that were commonly heard during the 60s, 70s, 80s or 90s are very rarely uttered today.
Below are 15 playground insults that were popular with schoolchildren back then but have faded from use.
They range from playful gibes you might trade with your best friend to more bilious terms you’d save for your worst enemy.
The sometimes surprising origins include medieval kings and literary giants, plus, more predictably, several euphemistic terms for human genitalia.
We’ve omitted the most vulgar, offensive and distasteful slang.
How many of these do you remember, and are there any other once-popular insults that you rarely hear anymore?
If you enjoyed this trip down memory lane, you might like this look back at the things you’ll only remember if you went to school in the 80s.
1. Berk
What sounds like an innocuous insult actually has a much ruder origin than many people realise, coming for the rhyming slang for Berkeley Hunt | Getty Images Photo: Fox Photos/Hulton Archive
2. Wazzock
For those who don't know, a wazzock is a stupid, silly or annoying person. The exact origins of the word are unknown but one theory is that it dates from medieval times, when kings would go to the loo over a shovel. The royal deposit would then be 'wazzed' out of the window, using a tool known as a 'wazzock'. | Heritage Images via Getty Images Photo: Heritage Art
3. Chinny Reckon
Not so much an insult as a saying casting doubt upon someone's trustworthiness. If you don't believe what someone's telling you, you might scratch your chin and respond 'chinny reckon'. Back in the day, some people recall using the term 'Jimmy Hill' - after the famous footballer turned pundit - in the same way. | Getty Images Photo: Evening Standard/Hulton Archive
4. Minger
This cruel insult was popular in the 90s and noughties. Minger, or minging, is used to describe something or someone ugly or unpleasant. It is believed to derive from the old Scottish English word ming, meaning a bad smell. | Hans Lucas/AFP via Getty Images Photo: MATTHIEU DELATY
5. Pillock
James May famously called Jeremy Clarkson an 'absolute pillock' for destroying his shed with an explosion in the TV special Top Ground Gear Force. What was once a common insult is now heard relatively rarely. It's believed to derive from the word pillcock, a term for the male genitals used in the mid-1500s. | Getty Images Photo: Stuart C. Wilson
6. Twerp
We may have Lord of the Rings author J. R. R. Tolkien to thank for this light-hearted gibe, describing a fool. In a letter to T.W. Earp, a contemporary of his at Oxford University, he called him the 'original twerp'. | AFP via Getty Images Photo: MICHAL CIZEK