rhatid

English

Etymology

Traditionally taken to be a Jamaican form of wrathed or wrothed, or possibly from or reinforced by rotted,[1] but other origins have also been proposed.[2]

Particle

rhatid

  1. (Jamaica) A swear word, like damn or hell.
    • 2004, Sonia Icilyn, One More Chance (→ISBN), page 112:
      "This married man told me his name was Graham Jefferson," she went on, "but his real name is Alan Clayton and he's Bren Hunter's brother-in-law." "But kiss me neck back to rhatid," Sarah cussed, in what was, to her, uncustomary usage of the Caribbean lingo. "They're related?" "Yes," Latisha confirmed.
    • 2005, Beresford McLean, Providence Pond (→ISBN), page 236:
      "Let him talk to your rhatid backside tonight!”
    • 2016, H M Hanlan, Sunset on the Horizon The Story of a Rebel Woman, Rebellion and the Jamaica Maroon Treaties (→ISBN):
      'No, but dih addah day dem did catch one big rhatid snake doh!' Jackman interjected.
    • 2017, Martin A. M. Gansinger, Radical religious thought in Black popular music. Five Percenters and Bobo Shanti in Rap and Reggae (→ISBN), page 93:
      As yet another example for that, Cyaah Gwaan To Rhatid (Lutan Fyah, 2015b) shows Lutan Fyah judging wit di Bible inna mi hand in regard to structural enforcements of gay liberation – 'cause Christ never make such law: (...) Things are changing And a lot a things that papa, mama preached against / Dem a force mi fi tolerate it (...) / Say that cyaah gwaan to rhatid / Mi a judge wit di Bible inna mi hand (...)

Alternative forms
  • ratid, raatid, rhaatid

References
  1. Elisa Janine Sobo, One Blood: The Jamaican Body (→ISBN), page 33 (1993): By picking fruit just as it "turns" from green Jamaicans avoid contamination with rot, which they fear greatly. The expletive rhatid expresses, as a homonym, the connection between rotted matter and problems worthy of wrath, which is pronounced "rhat" (Cassidy 1982, 175).
  2. L. Emilie Adams, Understanding Jamaican Patois: An Introduction to Afro-Jamaican Grammar (1991): raatid! or raatid a common mild expletive of surprise or vexation, as in to raatid! Although popular etymology often derives this word from the Biblical "wrath", pronounced raat, it is more likely a polite permutation of ras, a la "gosh" or "heck".

Further reading
  • 2016, KD Harris, Bloodlines - Awakening: Prequel to Medusa from the Lark Song Chronicles (→ISBN): Rhatid! Mild swearing (equivalent to – What the hell! Hell!) - Rhatid hole! Stronger swearing.
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