Balderdash & Piffle

The Oxford English Dictionary is asking for public assistance to help them trace the history of 40 well-known words and phrases.

The results of this new Wordhunt will feature in hit BBC Two series Balderdash & Piffle, presented by Victoria Coren, which returns this spring.

This year the OED and the BBC are appealing via the Balderdash & Piffle Wordhunt for help with words relating to dogs, fashion, and dodgy dealings, as well as for euphemisms, insults and some choice X-rated terms.

Did anyone go dogging before 1993, have a domestic before 1963 or go to the loo before 1940? The OED needs to know.

Who was Gordon Bennett, was his name really first invoked in 1967 and, above all, why?

Is Burnham-on-Sea in Somerset really the birthplace of the marital aid?

What's so daft about a brush?

The OED seeks to find the earliest verifiable usage of every single word in the English language – currently 600,000 and counting – and of every separate meaning of every word.

The 40 words on the new Wordhunt list all have a date next to them – corresponding to the earliest evidence the dictionary currently has for that word or phrase. But can the British public do better?