Green’s Dictionary of Slang

1. a prostitute.

1515		Cocke Lorelles Bote Ciii: Many whyte nonnes with whyte vayles, That was full wanton of theyr tayles.
1579		S. Gosson School of Abuse (1868) 37: [Whores] take sanctuary in fryeries, or liue a mile from the Cittie like Venus nunnes in a Cloyster at Newington, Ratliffe, Islington, Hogsdon or some such place, where like penitents, they deny the worlde, and spende theyr dayes in double deuotion.
1599		Nashe Praise of the Red Herring 43: O ware a naked man, Cithereaes Nunnes haue no power to resiste .
1607		Dekker & Webster Westward Hoe II ii: The Lob has his Lasse [...] the Seruing-man his Punke, the student his Nun in white Fryers.
c.1611		Fletcher Woman’s Prize IV iv: [She will] hire a piece of holy ground i’th’ Suburbs, And keep a Nest of Nuns.
1624		Fletcher Wife for a Month V i: As many mourning Bawds for thee, And holy Nuns, whose vestal fire ne’r vanishes, In sackcloth Smocks, as if thou wert Heir apparent To all the impious Suburbs, and the sink-holes.
a.1635		T. Randolph Complaint against Cupid 533: To Venus’ nuns an easier oath is read, She breaks her vow that keeps her maidenhead.
1640		J. Shirley Imposture II iii: I thought to have tasted nun’s flesh, but the general Has made it fasting-day.
1668		W. Charleton Ephesian Matron Pref. A3v: A Cyprian Nun, consecrated to the Goddess of Pleasure, inflamed with zeal of Priapus.
1671		‘Upon the Beadle’ in Lord Poems on Affairs of State 1 175: Their gen’rous fury, sprung from this just ground, / Because a nun of Whetstone prov’d unsound. [...] Brothers in arms, two more of Mars’s sons, / And both begot on Cytherean nuns.
1689		Collection of Poems against Popery ii: Their Church consists of vicious Popes, the rest Are whoring Nuns and bawdy Bugg’ring Priests [...] 22: For Lady Abbess shall appear An old Flux’d Bawd or Punk, Has F-k’d and B-gger’d Threescore Years, ... Religious Puns To teach the Nuns ... And modifie Their Lechery.
1691		R. Ames Female Fire-ships 14: What Man’s a Stranger to the fam’d Report, / Of the Religious Nuns of Sals’bury Court? / Who daily standing at their Convent Door, / And plying, seem to cry, next Whore, next Whore.
1700		T. Brown Amusements Serious and Comical in Works (1744) III 62: The sign of the Three Nuns very dismally painted, to keep up young womens antipathy to popery and maidenheads.
a.1723		‘Whipping-Tom’ Democritus 38: Here was a young Fornicator earnestly praying for a Bit of Nun’s Flesh.
1759		‘Hot Stuff’ Silber Songs of Independence (1973) 146: ‘If you please, Madam Abbess, a word with your nuns!’ / Each soldier shall enter the convent in buff, / And then, never fear, we will give them Hot Stuff!
1770		Foote Lame Lover in Works (1799) II 60: Who should trip by but an abbess, well known about town, with a smart little nun.
1771		R. King New London Spy 50: These dressed up ladies [...] who carry on the old business of basket making, under the sign of the Three Nuns.
1797		M. Leeson Memoirs (1995) III 149: He [...] frequently had the honours of visits from several of my nuns.
1808		G. Andrewes A Stranger’s Guide or Frauds of London 3: These old Bawds frequent [...] public places, with a young Nun (as they call her).
1821		Egan Life in London (1869) 205: Those three nymphs, who have so much dazzled your optics, are nuns; and the plump female is Mother . . . of great notoriety, but generally designated the Abbess of . . . . .
1833		Ely’s Hawk and Buzzard (N.Y.) 21 Sept. n.p.: The nuns who were at the Bowery theatre on Monday night, found business on the increase, the flats bit well and some of the prime uns nibbled. Paint add much to attract in the evening, and two covies found themselves in company not with virgins but half anotomized [sic] figures [i.e reminiscent of skeletons] when they awoke in the morning.
1842		Flash (NY) 4 Sept. n.p.: He learned from one of the inmates of the convent that one of her fellow nuns had introduced a customer, and after taking his money, had made an effort to leave his company.
1843		Satirist & Sporting Chron. (Sydney) 4 Feb. 3/3: Rather than see Wentworth returned [...] he will become Prior to a convent of Antiquated Nuns in the ‘middle leg of man’.
1861		(con. 1840s–50s) H. Mayhew London Labour and London Poor IV 251/2: The habitué [of a brothel] may miss the [...] unabashed impudence of the ‘nun’ who always appeared so fascinating and piquante.

2. a prude, a woman who is uninterested in sex.

1989

P. Munro Sl. U.