The worm of conscience still begnaw thy soul! Thy friends suspect for traitors while thou liv'st, And take deep traitors for thy dearest friends. No sleep close up that deadly eye of thine Unless it be while some tormenting dream Affright thee with a hell of ugly devils. Thou elvish-marked, accursed, rooting hog! Thou that was stamped in thy nativity The slave of nature and the son of hell. Thou slander of thy heavy mother's womb, Thou loathed issue of thy father's loins, Thou rag of honor, thou detested [insert name here]
Thou lewd guts-griping jack-a-nape!
eg, check out the Elizabethan curse generator on http://www.tower.org/insult/
A dervish and his disciple were walking down a dirt road. Suddenly, from behind them, they heard the sound of galloping horses, and dove into a ditch just in time to avoid being run down by a furiously driven chariot.
The dervish picked himself up, shook his fist at the rapidly departing chariot, and shouted, "May all your deepest desires be satisfied!"
"Why do you say that, master?" asked the disciple.
"If his deepest desires were satisfied," said the dervish, "do you think he would be out running dervishes into ditches?"
Thou whoreson cullionly barbermonger!
Thou whoreson zed! Thou unnecessary letter!
-King Lear
-Ancient Arabic Curse, by way of MarissaQuitt
"'May the IRS find that you deduct your pet sheep as an entertainment expense'"
- Pratical Demonkeeping by Christopher Moore, Chapter 5, page 40
(I'm a bit confused really, because the characters seemed to use almost exclusively commands, threats, and insults. "By the snout of a sick sea serpent, begone!", "To the grave with you, prickleface!", "Go itch a dragon!" sound like commands rather than curses to me. As m-w.com describes curse, "a prayer or invocation for harm or injury to come upon one". I.e. seems like the phrasing needs to be different than a directive. Not 'tie your shoes' but 'may your shoes be tied' or 'I call upon the spirits of a hundred bitter grandfathers to attack your shoe laces with spiked walking sticks so that they become tangled in a gorgon's knot'. I.e. 'may this happen to you' not 'please do this yourself'. I.e. 'I banish you' rather than 'begone'. Could someone please straighten me out here? Do the above count as curses?)