In any case, it seems to be rather more recent than “butty”. It’s not exactly clear when or where it originated, though. Sarnie, as mentioned, tends to be more common in the south of England though you will certainly hear it throughout Britain. It’s meant a few different things over the years, then, but today it generally just refers to a closed sandwich–usually with butter as the spread but not always! However, it often also denoted a hot savory filling in a breadcake, rather than an open sandwich. It’s thought that it originated as a kind of childish shortening of “bread and butter”, which is something you would give to children. It’s first attested in the middle of the 1800s and is widely believed to have originally been Liverpool slang which then spread to the rest of northern England. The term “butty” originated in the 19th Century, and at first did not refer to a sandwich but simply a buttered slice of bread, sometimes with something on top of it like meat or cheese. Let’s look at where these terms come from. “I just need to get a sarnie or something for the journey,” for example. It’s not demographically restricted, really, though older people are perhaps somewhat more likely to use it than others. It is perhaps somewhat more versatile, and the kind of thing you might use for any kind of sandwich. This one is also used up and down the country although you are probably more likely to hear it in the south and the midlands of England than elsewhere. The other most common slang term for sandwich in Britain is “sarnie”. “I’m going to make a butty, do you want one?” for example. The “chip butty” is a classic item in British fish and chip shops. It can be applied to virtually any kind of sandwich, though a simple sliced bread, butter and filling sandwich is the most likely.Ī grilled baguette or something like that probably isn’t very likely to be called a butty, but it’s still not impossible. That said, you’re quite likely to be understood wherever you use this term. This is mostly used in the north of England and in some parts of Scotland. One of the most common slang terms is “butty”. This is true virtually up and down the country, though there are many regions where you are more likely to hear slang terms than in other places. There are many commonly used slang terms, but if you take the British population as a whole, then most are not going to substitute a slang word when they want to say sandwich–they are just going to say sandwich! To start off, it’s worth pointing out that for the most part, people in Britain tend to simply refer to sandwiches as sandwiches.
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