Z is for Zounds! An Elizabethan Curse Word

It's always cool to learn archaic words. One word game we play at a writing retreat I attend involves finding flowery and bizarro words out of a Victorian era dictionary. So, I was delighted to run across a few Elizabethan curse words during my teaching of Dr. Faustus by Marlowe, a play I've taught now for a good seven years. I tell my students that they can safely curse away, without offending anyone, because no one will know what the heck they are saying!

Zounds is one such curse. It's an abbreviation of By God's Wounds:
Benvolio: "Zounds, Doctor, is this your villainy?"

Another rich curse is 'Sblood! It's short for By God's Blood:
Benvolio: "'Sblood, I am never able to endure these torments!"

And a third curse is 'Snails! This means By God's Nails:
Clown:"'Snails, what hast thou got there, a book? Why, thou canst not tell ne'er a word on't."

For your entertainment, here are more cool late Medieval words:
Pickadevant= a pointy beard
Costermonger= fruitseller
Profess= teach
lollard= heretic
Compass= embrace
Welkin= sky
I've enjoyed this A to Z Challenge, and meeting so many great bloggers. You are all fabulous! Here is a tiny sampling of some blogs I've learned a lot from:
Jaycee DeLorenzo's idioms theme here.
Caitlin's Logically blog where she informed us about important people and points in history here.
Stephen Tremp's blog theme on the habitable zone in space here.
I welcome my new followers and I'm excited to follow many new bloggers myself. As Faust would say, we have certainly not yet "canvassed every quiddity" (discussed every detail), so I look forward to many more discussions and posts! On Monday, May 7th I will be helping M. Pax celebrate her Backworld's book launch, and on May 23rd, the launch of Susan Kaye Quinn's Closed Hearts. Plus, stay tuned for more posts on the writing world and how to keep the creative juices flowing.
One exciting note, the eBook version of my YA thriller, Fireseed One just went on spring sale at $0.99 so if you're looking for a good nail-biter check it out here. Thanks!
How was your experience of A to Z?