Mr Seamus O'Brien of Bishopstown, Cork, tells me that he was surprised that his dictionary can shed no light on the origin of the word shoddy except to say that it is of unknown origin.
The adjective is certainly related to the noun shoddy, which was a woolen trade term: it meant waste from the carding machine and refuse from worsted spinning mills. The word was as you'd imagine, found mainly in Yorkshire and Leicestershire, but in Yorkshire shoddy was also the noun they used for inferior coal. In Co Antrim in the last century, shoddy was their word for the smaller stones found in a quarry; these weren't of much value. Shoddy dust was what Yorkshiremen and women called the minute wool fibres, mixed with oil and dirt; the refuse of scribbling and grinding machines used in the manufacture of shoddy. This stuff was sold to Kentish hopgrowers, the EDD says. In Antrim, shoddy flags were quarried flags of a poor quality; and in Lancashire a shoddy hole was simply a rubbish hole or tip. My guess is that the adjective came from the noun; but where the noun came from is anybody's guess.
The word oxter, the armpit, intrigues Ms Ruth Blake of Sandycove, who asks if the word is an Irish dialect word.
Oxter is certainly widely used in Ireland, but it is found too all over Scotland. In England it seems to be confined mainly to the north. The EDD has this interesting little quatrain from Antrim: "Whether would you rather Or rather would you be, Legs to the oxter Or belly to the knee?'
No MacTavish was ever lavish, Ogden Nash assures us; be that as it may, to the Highlander to come with the crooked oxter means to come with a present; and in the case of a wife, to bring a good dowry. But oxter also meant the bosom of Scotland; it's as well to know that if you, like me, are fond of Scots ballads; otherwise you'll wonder at wee Jock frae Auchtermuchty, or wherever, taking such an interest in his loved one's alluring oxters. You might also like to know that to oxter a woman means to fold her in your arms and give her a good hoult. Hence the splendid line in an Aberdeen song: "The foreman's in wi' the Missy, Sittin' oxterin' her in the kitchie."
A good old word, this oxter. The Old English was oxta, the armpit.