dates to the fifteenth century. Its earliest slang meaning mainly referred to sexual behavior, according to the English language historian Geoffrey Hughes: The early applications were to a promiscuous or sensual woman, a metaphorical extension of the behavior of a bitch in heat. Herein lies the original point of the powerful insult son of a bitch, found as biche sone ca. 1330 in Arthur and Merlin ... while in a spirited exchange in the Chester Play (ca. 1400) a character demands: "Whom callest thou queine, skabde bitch?" ("Who are you calling a whore, you miserable bitch?"). Bitch remained a strong insult through the nineteenth century. The entry in Francis Grose's Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue (1785) reads: A she dog, or doggess; the most offensive appellation that can be given to an English woman, even more provoking than that of whore, as may be gathered from the regular Billinsgate or St Giles answer–"I may be a whore, but can't be a bitch."Throughout the word's evolution into the nineteenth century, it became gradually less offensive. The Oxford English Dictionary in the nineteenth century described the insult as "strictly a lewd or sensual woman". The word went through many similar phases throughout history. It was not until the 20th century that feminism began to reevaluate the term and its appropriation. In the 1920s, bitch became once again a common insult used against women. The term bitch became more popular in common language during this era. Between 1915 and 1930, the use of "bitch" in newspapers and literature more than doubled. The writing of Ernest Hemingway popularized the more modern meaning of "bitch" in this era. He used it to represent favorable qualities such as ferocity, edginess, and grit. It was during this time that women began gaining more freedom (such as the right to vote through the Nineteenth Amendment). The word "bitch" during the twenties meant "malicious or consciously attempting to harm", "difficult, annoying, or interfering", and "sexually brazen or overly vulgar". According to Dr. Timothy Jay, there are "over 70 different taboo words", but 80 percent of the time only ten words are used, and bitch is included in that set. Being called the term bitch has been associated with worsening the mental health of women. Modern use In modern usage, the slang term bitch has different meanings depending largely on social context and may vary from very offensive to endearing,