Pronunciation
Etymology
() From Arabic بنت, girl or daughter, used to denote a patronym. The term entered the British lexicon during the occupation of Egypt at the end of the nineteenth century and stems, adopted by British soldiers to mean "girlfriend" or "bit on the side". It is used as a derogatory slang word in the United Kingdom meaning woman or girl. Its register varies from that of the harsher bitch to an only slightly derogatory, almost affectionate, term for a young woman, the latter being more commonly associated with the West Midlands. The term was used in British armed forces and the London area synonymously with bird in its slang usage (and sometimes brass) from at least the 1950s. The term has also famously been used in the classic film Monty Python and the Holy Grail, in which the Lady of the Lake is referred to as a "moistened bint", and in the phrase "grotty Scots bint" in the "English English" scene of the film ''Austin Powers in Goldmember. Following the Second World War, workers were imported from Yemen to fill the vacancies left in the Tyneside ship-building industry. The term found its way into the Geordie dialect from the late 1940s onwards and is still used to this day. Although the term can be used in a derogatory sense, in general it refers simply to (usually young) females.