Glossary
What did I say?
Below is a glossary of terms from the Phryne novels.
Act The Angora |
act the goat, play up, be irrational |
ANZACs | Australian and New Zealand Army Corps. Also biscuits. |
Art silk | artificial silk which brought silk stockings within a working class budget |
Away with the Pixies/Fairies | insane |
Axe-Handles | ie two axe-handles across the shoulders, broad in the beam. |
Ballyragged | Harassed, perstered |
Bastard | Australian usage: a term of familiarity rather than abuse ie "not a bad poor bloody old bastard". However, a Bad Bastard is a person who really should be pushed off the nearest cliff. OR, "It was a bastard" means it was very hard, dirty work. |
Barbola Work | A form of modelling clay used exclusively by amateurs. |
Barley Water | A refreshing lemon drink. |
Bandicoot | "Miserable as a bandicoot" - very miserable indeed, even though these marsupials are generally considered markedly cheerful. |
Bandoline | A very strong ladies' hair lacquer. |
Banned | Excluded from the pub. A terrible fate indeed. |
Bee In The Bonnet | An obsessional idea. |
Beeby | Mr Justice Beeby was the judge who handed down an iniquitous labour award for longshoremen in Australia in 1928. |
Besom | A twig broom or an old woman. |
Belting | Being beaten up by one or more assailants. |
Berlin Wool | Thick embroidery wool used for tapestry fire-screens. |
Beauty! or You Beaut! | wonderful, excellent. |
Bijou | French for jewel; dainty and precious. |
Blanky | Self-censored form of bloody used in polite company. |
Blighter | Reprehensible person. |
Blighty | England, the Old Country etc |
Block | Doing One's Block means to lose one's temper completely. |
Bloody | Can mean almost anything, but mostly an emphatic form of punctuation. |
Bludger | Always a fighting insult, workshy and lazy. |
Blue | Blue humour is rude, someone called Blue has red hair, to make a blue is to make an error and a blue can also be a fight. |
Bluestone College | Pentridge (a notoriously rough jail in Melbourne). |
Bob | A shilling (dime). |
Bodgy | Flawed, faulty. |
Bonce | Head. |
Buggered | Completely exhausted, ruined or broken. NEVER used in connection with sodomy. |
Cachous | small sweets, favoured by old ladies |
Carnies | carnival people, proprietors of side shows. |
Cat-wash | to wash the face, armpits, groin and feet in a kettle of water: also known as an APC (armpits and crotch) which acronym also meant aspirin, phenacetin and coedine, a headache remedy. A fast wash. See 'a lick and a promise' |
Calsomime | coloured whitewash, a cheap form of paint. |
Chocolate Paper Pictures | also called 'tinsel pictures' pictures made of the coloured silver paper from chocolates. |
Cloche | a close fitting felt hat, globular in shape. |
Chin Chin | a toast: reply to 'mud in your eye'. |
Companionate Marriage | a 'white marriage' with no sexual contact. |
Corporation | ( inclining to a) respectable gentleman who is growing what, in a working man, would be called a beer belly. |
Cold Collation | a salad with cold meat |
Colonial/My Colonial Oath | 'bloody right' |
Corker/Corking | wonderful |
Crook(going) | go crook is to complain loudly. A crook is a criminal. |
To be Crook | is to be sick. A crook tin of meat has gone bad. |
Crown | to crown someone is to hit them over the head. |
Crust | cheek; 'he had the crust so say...' Also 'earn a crust' earn a living. |
Dingbat | a mad person |
Docket | a criminal record |
Doctor Nikola | the arch-villain in Guy Boothby's novels. Always seen with his black cat on his shoulder. It sneered. |
Diggers | Australian soldiers |
Dob | to dob someone in is to inform on them to authority |
Dog | only a dog dobs someone in |
Dowie/Doo | Scottish usage for 'dove' |
Elinor Glyn | wrote steaming novels of throbbing passion. |
Eat More Fruit | a campaign by Railways Commissoner Clapp to support growers |
Epergne | large silver or china bowl which obstructs cross the table conversation. Usually filled with flowers. |
Ek saal en plan maak | quote from John Buchan's Peter Pienaar. Transvaal Africaans for 'sit down and make a plan' |
Fantan | Chinese gambling game. |
Fast | a girl who may find herself in trouble; a flirt. |
Flat Stony Motherless | entirely without capital of any kind |
Feejee Mermaid | a palpably false creature made of a mummified fish and a really dead monkey, foisted on the public by P.T.. Barnum. Who was right about suckers. |
Flapper | originally a schoolgirl with her hair in a braid down her back; later a fashionable woman with short skirts, short hair, and no corset. |
Fitrzroy cocktail | methylated spirits(wood alcohol) ginger and brown boot polish, or red wine and methylated spirits. Not recommended. Fitzroy was a slum. |
Food reform | movement towards fresh fruit and vegetables, low fat and salt and no alcohol. Heavy on carrot. |
Gallimaufry | a collection of different fish or meats, set in aspic |
Game (on the) | A prostitute |
Gees | horses |
Gelt | money |
Ghosts | Chinese slang for white people |
Glory-Box | a trousseau made by a young woman while she is waiting to be married. Contained all her household linen. |
Giggle-Juice | alcohol |
Grues | 'gives me the grues' makes me shiver. |
Gussied-up | dressed for a party |
Guineas | a coin worth one pound and one shilling. |
Half pi full of ink | half-drunk |
Half-inch | rhyming slang for 'pinch' to steal |
Heart Starter | a shot of alcohol to begin the new daya shot of alcohol to begin the new day |
Half-cut | Half Drunk |
Hellenic beverage | Phryne's very strong Greek coffee |
His Majesty's Pleasure | committed to a lunatic asylum rather than jail for as long as necessary; an indefinite sentence. |
Houshold supply | large sized packet or bottle for household use |
Jack Robinson | 'before you can say Jack Robinson' means instantly, immediately. As even Brewer isn't sure where it came from, your imagination can range freely, as mine did. |
Jacks | police |
Jazz coloured | pink, black and silver, green, black and gold. Usually in stripes. |
Jaeger suit | as worn by G B Shaw, a 'hygenic' suit. Looked tweedy. |
Jenny Hanniver | a fish which when dried can be modelled into the frightful underwater denizen of your choice. |
Jo Jo the Dog Faced Boy | a ' freak' working for P T Barnum; his face was covered with hair. |
Keeled over | fell over slowly. |
Kero tin | was used for domestic heating and lighting, so a kerosene tin was part of the furniture, and was used, for example, as the wicket in every street game of cricket. |
Knut | a dandy |
King hit | the one beautiful punch which ends the fight. |
koko-for-the-hair | a popular shampoo which, if used once a month, instilled coconut oil into dry hair. |
Ladies' Travelling Necessities | disposable sanitary pads |
Lair | a lair is an apprentice villain with too much hair oil and no brains; a mug lair is a gullible one. |
Lantern lectures | slide shows. |
Loose in the hilts | A lady who might be 'fast' |
louis heel | a curved heel, very elegant but not high. Perhaps an inch. |
Mad as a cut snake | very mad indeed. |
Mate | very significant male relationship. Your mate would die for you. Without asking. |
Mash | brew the tea. |
Maskeleyne | very skilled English stage magician. |
Megrims | similar to the vapours. Need to go and lie down for an hour. |
Mental | 'she's mental' she's insane'. |
Mickey/Mickey Finn | good solid dose of fast acting soporific in a drink. |
Mrs Mopps | a domestic cleaner. |
Mommets | dolls; used of children. |
Moleskins | very stout canvas trousers, usually to be found standing at the foot of a worker's bed. |
Mug | a gullible fool |
Muscle in | shove yourself bodily into a conversation or situation |
Mutt and Jeff | rhyming slang 'deaf' |
Murder in the chookhouse | screaming and panic, used esp of massed female expostulations; derived perhaps from a fox in the hen house. |
Murphies | potatoes |
Nark | an informer |
Natural | a 'natural' is a child with some congenital cognition fault; also used as emphasis ' a natural-born bastard' |
Night Soil | sewage |
Nosy-parker | an inquisitive person |
On for young and old | the fight in the pub has just included the barman. |
Old fashioned look | disapproving glare. |
Old man | father, husband or boss. |
OP rum | over proof rum, much stronger than usual. |
Out of the top drawer | from the best families |
Paddy | An Irish person. Also, a fit of bad temper. |
Pattens | boots on high rings to keep feet out of mud or water. |
Pat Malone | rhyming slang; on my own, alone. |
Plackets | petticoat pockets, separate from the garment, or the slits in skirts made so that they could be reached |
Phiz-gig | an informer ( from phiz, face, gig, to look; one who looks at people and tells the police what they have been doing.) |
Plates of Meat | rhyming slang: feet |
poke borak | to swear or jeer (19th century usage and aboriginal word) |
Primus stove | a spirit stove for boiling a kettle without lighting the main stove. |
Punter | a person who wagers money on anything - also called a mug. |
Q.T. | 'on the QT' means quietly, without attracting notice. |
Queered | to 'queer our pitch' is to foil our plan |
Quid | one pound - a note. |
Raree show | a carnival or side show |
Ratbag | literally a mad person, but can be affectionate. |
Red-ragger | a communist (because of the red flag) |
Red biddy | ruby port and methylated spirits. |
Rusticated | for a student, sent down for a term. |
Rye buck on a straight wire | an honest deal. 'rye buck' means 'good' |
Scab | killing insult even today. One who breaks a strike. |
Shill | a person who entices the crowd to try, ie, a shooting gallery. |
Shirty | angry |
Skin | a bank note |
Skint | totally broke |
Skipping Girl | famous neon sign advertising vinegar. |
Silver-tail | a rich person. |
Six oclock swill | when the pubs closed at six, there was a rush to down as much as possible before the doors closed. This explained why sly grog (q.v) flourished until the licencing hours were relaxed. |
Sly grog | illegal sales of alcohol outside drinking hours. |
Staling | urinating ( agricultural) |
Standover men | those who extract money by threats of arson or injury |
S.P | starting price bookmakers - very illegal. |
Stoush | A fight |
Soul-case | the body, but 'he beat the soul case out of him' is a very bad beating indeed. |
Suss | suspicious |
Sugar Sacks | calico sacks, used for clothing the poor. |
Sundowner | a swagman, a tramp. |
Swaggie | one who carries a rolled blanket 'drum' and walks from farm to farm, seeking work and handouts. |
Tanner | sixpence |
Tar brush | 'a touch of the tar brush' implies black or coloured ancestry. |
Thimble-rigger | offers a game with three cups and a ball which you cannot win. |
Three card trick | also known as find the lady; guess which one of these cards is the queen. See 'thimble rigger' for your chances of success. |
Thomas Atkins | 'Tommy' the name for any English soldier. |
Tickety boo | excellent. |
Two Bob Watch | not a reliable source of information. |
Turkey lolly | spun sugar or fairy floss. |
Turps | alcohol, implies alcoholism or a Fitzoy cocktail (q.v.) |
Virgin Sturgeon | student song 'caviar comes from the virgin sturgeon, the virgin sturgeon's a very fine fish. The virgin sturgeon needs no urgin', that's why caviar's a very rare dish'. |
Wallaby | the wallaby's track - tramping the outback (see swaggie) |
Wet arse and no fish | an unsuccessful venture. |
Wharfie | a longshoreman. |
White Slavery | an urban legend about young women going, i.e. into a theatre toilet and later waking up confined to a Turkish brothel. |
Whiz bang | WW1 slang for high explosive shells. |
Winceyette | a cheap and nasty knitted material for underclothes, etc. |
Zinc | the counter in a French bistro |