Green’s Dictionary of Slang

strip v.

1. (UK Und.) to rob a house, esp. when the thieves empty it of all moveable contents.

[UK]B.E. Dict. Canting Crew n.p.: Strip, c. to Rob or Gut a House, to unrig any Body, or to Bite them of their Money. Strip the ken, c. to Gut the House. Strip the Table, c. to Winn all the Money on the Place.
[UK]Bailey Universal Etym. Eng. Dict. n.p.: strip to rob or gut a House.
[UK]G. Kersh Fowlers End (2001) 4: Turn your back for five minutes and they strip the place to the bone.

2. to rob a person.

see sense 1.
[Ire]J. Carrick Account of Robberies 7: A third [...] who was going to Ireland, was stripped by us on the Chester-Road.
[UK]Proceedings at Sessions (City of London) Oct. 9/2: It was not I that strip’d the Gentleman, it was Michael Nichols.
[UK]Smollett Peregrine Pickle (1964) 365: He had been stripp’d by a company of sharpers.
[UK]M. Leeson Memoirs (1995) III 245: It was generally believed that I was one of the persons who had been stripped.
[Scot]Dundee Courier 19 July 3/2: Two ragged ruffians pounced upon him with a demand for his watch and purse [...] said Scholtz ‘Put up your knives, you won’t need them. Strip me by all means but for heaven’s sake be quick about it, for it is as cold as a wolf’s throat’.
[UK]Bucks. Herald 1 July 7/1: ‘They say [...] if they get hold of me [...] they’ll strip me; and if they do they will have all my money’.
[UK]Sporting Times 1 Jan. 1/5: Two Labour lags who lounged hard by laughed so immoderately that they almost let the pigeon go unstripped.
[US]J. Lait ‘Canada Kid’ Beef, Iron and Wine (1917) 153: I strip him for a leather poke an’ duck in an alley an’ look inside.
[US]D. Clemmer Prison Community (1940) 336/1: strip, vt. To take money from a wallet; to rob.

3. (US campus) to upset or harm a person.

[US]Eble Campus Sl. Mar. 8: strip – mistreat someone, do someone a disservice. ‘Kris really stripped me when she spilt wine all over my white dress.’.

SE in slang uses

In compounds

strip-bush (n.) [laundry was orig. laid out on hedges to dry]

one who steals washing from its drying lines.

[UK]Hotten Sl. Dict.
strip-down (n.)

(US) an automobile that has been modified to improve its performance.

[US]E. Thompson Garden of Sand (1981) 13: There was hue and cry for banning ‘collegiate cars,’ as the stripdowns being put together in gasoline alleys all over town were called.
strip joint (n.) (also strip club) [joint n. (3b)]

(US) a bar or club that offers striptease shows.

[US]Sun (Baltimore) 27 June 30/3: Prince Georges County Sheriff Carlton Beall began a crackdown on what he called ‘strip joints’.
[US]Rigney & Smith Real Bohemia 158: A transient prosperity was created in the 1940’s by the war, which brought B-girls, prostitutes, and strip joints.
[UK]C. Dexter Last Seen Wearing in Second Morse Omnibus (1994) 404: Ever been to a strip club, Lewis?
[UK]J. Rosenthal Spend, Spend, Spend Scene 92: I got kicked out [...] For offending the Pope – which I didn’t; threatening to open a strip joint – which I didn’t.
[US]N. Pileggi Wiseguy (2001) 70: I knew there were a bunch of strip joints along Baltimore Street.
[UK]Guardian Travel 3 July 11: The increasing amount of pizza and lager bars and strip joints that are opening up.
strip show (n.) (also strip)

(orig. US) a striptease show.

[US]D. Runyon ‘Neat Strip’ Runyon on Broadway (1954) 620: That is a right neat strip you do out there just now.
[US]F. Brown Dead Ringer 21: Your cooch shows would be strips.
[US](con. early 1950s) J. Ellroy L.A. Confidential 466: He grew into his teens [...] hiding out in skid row strip shows.

In phrases

strip a peg (in Plunket Street) (v.) [Plunket Street, the old-clothes market in Dublin]

(Irish) to dress in second-hand clothes.

[Ire]Freeman’s Jrnl (Dublin) 2 Dec. 2/2: Whether the Premier be again disposed to array himself in the cast garments of Whiggery, or strip a peg himself in the warerooms of Bright, Cobden, and Co.
[UK]Belfast News-Letter 12 Apr. 3/5: Necessities may and do arise amongst the poorer classes here as elsewhere for cast-offs. But why any sane being ashould ‘strip a peg’ of such things [...] passes comprehension.
[Ire]Share Slanguage.
strip-me-naked (n.)

see separate entries.

strip teeth and bite (v.)

(Aus.) to become fiercely argumentative.

[Aus]Bulletin (Sydney) 23 Nov. 15/1: They chummed with cabmen, hodmen and the like; but stripped teeth and bit when anyone opposed the tenets of Anglicanism.

In exclamations

strip me!

a general excl. of imprecation.

[UK]Foote The Minor 38: Strip me, if I would bet five shillings against the whole gang.