Must Be A Woolyback Word - But No! Sick Innit?

Went to Birkenhead yesterday to watch the mighty Lincoln City Football Club against Tranmere Rovers. Excellent day out and not a bad result Nil - Nil against them in the FA Cup. Replay on Tuesday at Sincil Bank. However I digress.

Stuck on the wall of the stand was this sign:

Now that was a word I have never seen before. Vomitory. Thought it really had to be a Woolyback word. For the reader not acquainted with the term Woolyback (or Wools), it is a word used by Scousers, those born within Liverpool, for those that sound like Scousers and sometimes calling themselves Scousers who are actually from one of the towns surrounding Liverpool, such as Birkenhead. Still with me? Good oh.

So back to this word Vomitory. What does it actually mean? Is it to do with vomiting? Well yes and no from my investigations.

Apparently the term is derived from a Vomitoriom, which for some strange reason, is a Roman word for a passageway or alleyway which connects the outside to a row of seats. In the case of Tranmere Rovers, according to one of the stewards who should know, their vomitory or is that vomitori in the plural, are the stairwells leading down from the seating in the stands to the space underneath which houses the bar and the food outlets. Talkng of food and drinks, this leads me to another savoury tidbit, sorry about that, from my investigations. Apparently the vomitorium became a place where the ancient Romans went to vomit up the food they had already eaten to make way for some more. Delightful no? Does that mean they were all bulimic?

In the vernacular Sick innit mate?

Life, as they say, is a classroom every day.

I hope all of that was as educational for you as it was for me.

Valeat quantum valere potest.